Clash of Civilizations
by BloodRavenFan
Summary: The reborn Principality of Zeon leaves the Earth Sphere for a new beginning in the great ocean of space. But flaws in their machines result in an unexpected outcome.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I do not own any characters, names, and any copyrighted material used in this work. This is a fanfic, period. Everything belongs to their respective owners. Comments and constructive criticism are all very much appreciated.

Prologue

The long war between the Spacenoids and the Earth-born was finally over. Against all odds, the legendary Red Comet, Char Aznable, had surfaced during the final battle, defeated his Cyber-Newtype 'copy' Full Frontal and had secured Laplace's Box...and with it, the future of the entire Earth Sphere. The revelation of the original Universal Century Charter - signed into law by the very first Federation Assembly - had shattered the rule of the Earth-born over the Earth Sphere once and for all. While it was accepted that the Earth Federation would continue to exist - albeit in an entirely different form - no longer would the Earth-born dominate the government. From now on, the Spacenoids would have a fair say in the governance and the future of Humanity. Already some things had changed; for starters, a new Federation Assembly had been convened at von Braun City on the Moon, which had now replaced Dakar as the Federation capital. A new economic system - one not dependent on Earth - was forming, and the strict and biased laws regarding immigration between Earth and the space colonies were being amended.

But the greatest change of all (so far) was the re-establishment of the Principality of Zeon under Sovereign Mineva Lao Zabi. Following her coronation at Side 3, which was attended by delegates from all over the Solar System, Mineva swore to restore the tarnished honor of Zeon and to atone for the past mistakes of the Zabi Dynasty. And her first step in doing so was to announce the imminent departure of the entirety of Side 3 from the Solar System by using a new hyper-space fold system integrated into the space colonies of Side 3. Surprisingly enough, her announcement was met with wide acceptance from the people of Side 3; despite the encouraging changes in the Earth Sphere, many wanted to leave the blood-stained realm of Earth and start a new life elsewhere, and Mineva fully understood their sentiments.

* * *

"They're really leaving then, I take it?" Amuro said, floating up to Bright's chair on the Ra Cailum's bridge.

"They really are." Beltorchika replied, floating up to stand beside Amuro.

"Captain Bright..." Amuro said, causing the Captain to look at him. "...can we send a final message to Zeon?"

"I suppose we can." Bright replied, making a gesture to the crewman manning the communications console, who began to make the appropriate preparations.

* * *

"Captain Char..." an officer called to the blonde Newtype standing beside and quietly conversing with the seated Sovereign in the Zeon command centre. "...we have an incoming message from the Federation flagship."

"Patch it through." he replied.

"To the people of Zeon..." the message began. "...Godspeed to you and the stars smile upon your path. Though we may never see each other again, there will always be a place for you here, for you remain and will always be children of the Earth. Farewell."

"That was short..." Mineva noted, but her face had a thoughtful and understanding expression. "...but touching nevertheless. In any case, I believe we have tarried long enough...commence the final preparations."

"All fold systems standing by."

"All colonies report their link to the Side-wide astral-navigation network."

"Signal status...green."

"Execute hyper-space fold jump!"

* * *

Amuro, Beltorchika, Bright, and the rest of the Ra Cailum's bridge crew watched in silence as the colonies of Side 3 were wrapped in iridescent globes of light, before vanishing and leaving nothing but empty space behind.

"Godspeed Char..." Amuro whispered his final farewell to his old friend and rival, wrapping an arm around Beltorchika's shoulders while she placed her head on his shoulder, and Bright stood and saluted Zeon's departure on their great journey to find a new life amidst the endless stars.

* * *

A/N

Yes, I know it's short, but it works as a prologue.


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer: I do not own any characters, names, and any copyrighted material used in this work. This is a fanfic, period. Everything belongs to their respective owners. Comments and constructive criticism are all very much appreciated.

Chapter 1: Friction

Captain Andre sighed as he and his squadron – four Drake-class Escort Ships – flew a wide, eccentric, orbital patrol around the Moon. He knew he should be thankful that he hadn't encountered any ZAFT vessels in his patrol around the Moon, but still, as a soldier he found the lack of action somewhat galling.

"I wish something interesting would turn up…" he muttered under his breath. He immediately regretted saying that, as in the next moment, a space colony had appeared out of nowhere right in the middle of his squadron's flight path.

"Main engines, full reverse!" he ordered, his eyes going wide with panic and surprise, his expression mirrored by those of his bridge crew. As the Drakes slowed down to a crawl, Andre looked around in shock; not just one, but many colonies had appeared, occupying a large portion of L2. They resembled Orb's O'Neill-type space colony of Heliopolis, but lacked the giant mirrors and windows characteristic of the design.

"Contact the Lunar Base…" he ordered. "…space colonies don't just…" He broke off as the communications crewman picked up an incoming transmission.

"Unidentified vessel, this is Deikun City Aerospace Command; identify yourself immediately."

Swallowing, he replied "This is Captain Andre Ciel from the Atlantic Federation's First Lunar Patrol of the Third Orbital Fleet."

"…did you say 'Atlantic Federation'?" the reply came after a long pause and what sounded like a muffled argument.

"Yes…may I ask your affiliation?"

"Uh, we're with the Principality of Zeon but anyway can you tell us what year it is?"

"Cosmic Era 71, of course." he replied, perplexed by the question.

"Alright…please standby captain."

After five tense minutes, the line came back online. "Captain Ciel, you probably won't believe us, but it seems we're from another world, or rather, a parallel universe from yours. I know it sounds outlandish, but Sovereign Zabi would like to meet with you in person and explain the situation personally."

After a moment, Andre nodded, and said "Standby, I'll be heading down personally."

Turning to his crew, he ordered "Maintain a parallel course with the colony."

"Sir, with all due respect, I don't think…"

"Space colonies don't just appear out of nowhere, ensign. Personally, I'm inclined to believe their claims that they're from another world. I'm sure there's an interesting story behind this, but this is a good chance to get new allies, and we're going to have to put forward our best foot if we're to take advantage of this situation."

"Sir, yes sir."

* * *

Within minutes, Andre found himself landing in Deikun City's main hangar, where he was met by an honour guard of green-uniformed and steel-helmeted soldiers led by a junior officer who proceeded to escort him to a linear car that ran along the colony's outer wall. While their green uniforms uncomfortably reminded him of ZAFT soldiers, he also noted the black cape and stylized gold embroidery of the officer's uniform.

After a relatively short trip, they transferred to an electric car that drove him through a somewhat hectic city before landing him before a large building in a walled enclosure. Entering the building, he noted the tense atmosphere in the entrance hall, where officers in green and black spoke urgently with government officials in business suits. "Lieutenant Banner…" a man called from nearby, drawing the attention of his escort's leader.

"I'll take care of this." The man said, and the young officer saluted before turning to leave. "If you would please follow me…"

Bemused, Andre followed the man to an elevator, through a series of hallways, and finally to an office commanding a wide view of the city below. Three people spoke quietly there, two officious men in business suits and a young woman in red and gold. The three broke off as he entered, the guide closing the door behind him as he stepped out.

"Ah, Captain Ciel…" the young woman said, stepping forward to shake his hand with a smile, before introducing herself and the two men with her. "…I am the Sovereign of Zeon, Mineva Lao Zabi. This is Zeon Prime Minister Xavier, and Deikun City Mayor Valerius. Welcome to Zeon, captain."

"It's an honour, your Highness." He said, feeling somewhat out of place.

Nodding, Mineva walked back to her desk and sat down. "Now then, down to business. If you would enlighten us to your world and its setting, we would be more than happy to inform you of our origins."

* * *

"Did you say they're from another world?" the admiral asked incredulously, causing the lieutenant on the screen to fidget uncomfortably.

"Yes sir, that's what they said."

The admiral sighed, leaned back and looked at the rest of his Command Staff in the Atlantic Federation's Lunar Base. As much as he hated to admit it, it was quite possibly the only rational explanation as to the sudden appearance of a large number of space colonies from out of nowhere. "And Captain Ciel went alone to negotiate opening relations with the newcomers?"

"Yes sir."

"I see…that will be all for now, lieutenant."

"Sir, yes sir." The lieutenant saluted before the link cut off.

"Captain Ciel has overstepped his authority, admiral." One of his officers stated. "He should have consulted with us before making such a critical move…"

The admiral raised a hand for silence before saying "Captain Ciel is a field officer. He made a tactical decision and did what he thought best in this situation. I for one intend to reserve judgment until after the results have made themselves manifest."

* * *

"Chief, we have more incoming vessels approaching from the opposite direction as the Federation vessels."

Cursing under his breath, the chief operations officer at the Deikun Aerospace Command monitoring centre opened up a link. "Unidentified vessel, this is Deikun City Aerospace Command, identify yourselves."

"This is the ZAFT…Descartes."

After another discussion similar to the discussion with the Federation vessels from earlier on, another officer, this one from ZAFT, was on his way to meet with the Sovereign, while two groups of vessels hung in parallel courses around Deikun City.

* * *

"What have I done?" Mineva lamented, slumping in her chair in her office in Zeon's capital of Deikun City. "I had intended to lead our people to a new beginning across the great ocean of space...but instead, I simply exchanged one hell for another."

"Don't blame yourself, Mineva." Char said. "We had no way of knowing that instead of taking us to Alpha Centauri the hyper-space fold system would take us into a parallel universe. We should consider ourselves lucky that all colonies survived the trans-dimensional transit undamaged, to say nothing of the relatively restrained reaction to our arrival in this world, considering their current circumstances."

Mineva passed a hand over the files on her desk and snorted. "Naturals...Coordinators...a war on a smaller scale yet still all-too similar to the One Year War...I'm surprised we don't have riots exploding across Side 3 as a result of this bloody catastrophe."

"Yes, but with the fold systems irreparably and most importantly, obviously, fried, the announcement regarding our botched FTL jump has been met surprisingly well." an aide reported. "Both the Earth Alliance and the PLANTs have also received our data-stream and have requested a meeting regarding our future standing in this world."

"I will not lead Zeon into war." Mineva said firmly, standing up and heading for the door followed by Char and her aide. "Nor will I allow either of the opposing factions to enter Side 3. If they want to meet with us, it will be in neutral territory in open space. Place the military on alert, and prep the Gwadan for launch – we'll be heading out once the emergency senate session is closed. Inform both ZAFT and the Alliance of our decision."

"How do you intend to deal with both the Senate and the public, your Highness?"

"We are a democracy. Zeon is no longer a tyranny governed by my fool of an uncle, Gihren. Therefore, we will tell both the Senate and the public the truth. They need to be informed of this situation, before we can make a decision regarding our future in this world."

* * *

Three Alliance warships, one Nelson-class and two Drake-class traveled towards the rendezvous point. Aboard the battleship, Atlantic Federation Vice-Foreign Minister Allster conversed with the ship's captain. "Do you think the Zeon will align themselves with us or with ZAFT? Or will they opt to remain neutral?" the captain asked.

"To be honest, I'm not sure." Minister Allster replied. "If they would align with us it would be a big help, considering the sheer size of their population, around two billion if they're not exaggerating the data, to say nothing of their industrial capabilities."

"The opposite would hold true if they sided with ZAFT. And if they chose neutrality it wouldn't do any of us or the ZAFT good, much like Orb..." the captain's reply was cut off as alarms began to blare across the bridge.

"N-Jammer interference is increasing rapidly...captain, this is deliberate!"

The captain cursed. "It would appear ZAFT has no intention of allowing us to make contact with Zeon. All hands to stations, and issue a Level One Battle Alert."

* * *

"We're detecting massive electromagnetic interference in this entire region of space." a crewman at the Gwadan's sensor console reported.

"M-Particles? No, it's probably an N-Jammer." the captain said. "It looks like either the Alliance or ZAFT has no intention of adhering to the arrangements of the upcoming negotiations. Check the status of our reactors."

"Sir, all of our reactors are functioning at normal parameters."

"That's not surprising..." Mineva commented from her seat on the bridge. "...N-Jammers only interfere with fission reactions and our reactors make use of aneutronic fusion reactions."

"So it would appear...hurry and send out a scout!"

* * *

"All mobile armors have launched!"

"We've detected enemy mobile suit squads - eighteen units!"

"Damn ZAFT! They really don't want us meeting with Zeon do they?" the captain snarled before turning to Minister Allster. "Minister, please proceed to the launch bay and to your personal shuttle. I cannot guarantee your safety against eighteen GINNs."

"I understand." Minister Allster said, wiping his face before heading for the bridge doors as the captain bellowed out orders.

* * *

"Incoming laser communication...ZAFT and the Earth Alliance are engaged in combat, eighteen mobile suits against twelve space fighters. The Alliance appears to be on the defensive."

"Well, isn't this nostalgic." Mineva commented sarcastically. "I seem to recall back during the Gryps War when Haman was going to meet with the AEUG and the Titans and the latter ambushed the former before they could rendezvous with this same ship. Or was it the other way around?"

"Your Highness, do we engage or do we fall back?"

"Let's go and help the Alliance out. While I still have no intention of entering this war, I believe we may have an easier time negotiating with people who actually try to adhere to our agreement regarding the negotiations."

"Understood; have the 10th MS Team launch immediately!"

"I'll be heading out myself." Char said with a nod to Mineva. "Prep the Nightingale for launch."

* * *

A/N

Is Mineva being herself or is she too OOC? Tell me your opinions and I'll edit accordingly.


	3. Chapter 3

Disclaimer: I do not own any characters, names, and any copyrighted material used in this work. This is a fanfic, period. Everything belongs to their respective owners. Comments and constructive criticism are all very much appreciated.

Chapter 2: First Impressions

In theory, it would normally take five Mobius mobile armours to successfully engage, and more importantly, defeat a single GINN mobile suit. In reality, it would take much more just to survive against the increasingly experienced ZAFT mobile suit pilots (the sole exception being the Mobius Zero mobile armours, which could engage and win against mobile suits on their own).

The battle was a clear example of this combat reality; the eighteen GINNs split into three groups of six, the first group moving to engage the twelve Mobius mobile armours launched by the Alliance warships while the other two groups moved to flank and attack the Alliance vessels. Despite their desperate courage, and their superior numbers (they outnumbered the ZAFT mobile suits two-to-one), they were simply overwhelmed in no time at all, after which the ZAFT mobile suits moved to assist in attacking the Alliance warships.

To their credit, the Alliance warships did a sterling job of holding their own against the mobile suits, keeping them at a relatively safe distance with excellent application of suppression fire and keeping them busy with steady missile salvoes. Inevitably, two of the GINNs broke through and attacked a Drake-class; one moved to attack the bridge, but was literally torn apart by one of the Drake-class' 75mm machine guns. The other GINN however, quickly avenged its fallen comrade by raking the Drake's port side with armour-piercing rounds from its 500mm recoilless rifle, causing the ravaged Drake-class to explode in short order.

The ZAFT assault building up momentum (regardless of the loss of a GINN which been destroyed by one of the Nelson-class' dual beam cannons), one of the GINNs flew behind the other Drake-class and tore its engines to shreds, crippling the hapless vessel.

"Is there nothing we can do?" the Nelson-class' captain ground out, even as the remaining Drake-class exploded and the ten GINNs swarmed the Nelson-class. A dual beam cannon salvo claimed another GINN, before another mobile suit destroyed the same weapon with its 500mm recoilless rifle. Cursing under his breath, the captain opened a link to the Minister's shuttle. "Minister Allster; we can't hold for much…"

"Captain…!" one of the bridge crew interrupted with a panicked voice, causing the captain to look up and see the GINN aiming its 76mm machine gun at the bridge. The captain gasped and his eyes widened in horror even as the ZAFT pilot pulled the trigger…only for the GINN to be impaled by a bright yellow beam and explode. Two other beams followed and two more ZAFT mobile suits suffered the same fate; a fourth GINN actually managed to avoid a beam, but lost its right arm in the process.

"W-what was that?" the pilot asked in confusion; his answer was a good distance away from the combat zone, where the red, gold, and black giant that was the Nightingale and its pilot hung in space. Forcing his Newtype powers to the limit, Char aimed and fired his heavy beam rifle, and destroyed another GINN even as three Geara Dogas finally caught up with and passed the Nightingale, their mono-eyes flashing menacingly as they entered the combat zone.

The partially-disarmed GINN drew its sword and moved to attack a Geara Doga, which brutally shouldered aside the ZAFT mobile suit's swing before swinging its heat bayonet two-handed and gutted the GINN. The other two Geara Dogas hotly pursued three GINNs, which abruptly decelerated in an effort to force the Zeon mobile suits to overshoot. However, the Zeon pilots had anticipated this, swinging to the sides; one of them quickly turned and fired a grenade and crippled a GINN. Before the remaining ten GINNs could fully recover from their surprise, the Nightingale arrived and launched its funnels, brutally destroying all the ZAFT mobile suits in a blazing barrage of yellow beams. Re-orienting itself, the Nightingale replaced its heavy beam rifle's E-Pack before firing off a hi-beam shot towards what appeared to be a random direction, or so it seemed to the shocked and astounded Alliance bridge crew.

But for the crew of the ZAFT Nazca-class Destroyer Galileo, it was anything but random. The bridge crew were still trying to make sense of the loss of contact with all their mobile suits when the Nightingale's hi-beam shot literally bisected and destroyed the Galileo. The captains of the two flanking Laurasia-class Frigates didn't even have the time to pull themselves out of the shock of witnessing the destruction of their flagship when the Nightingale's funnels closed the range and tore the ships apart before returning to their mother unit.

The Nelson-class' captain watched in awe and shock as the three Geara Dogas formed an escort around his ship, while the Nightingale took up a position beside the bridge. "Captain…" a crewman piped up. "…we're receiving a transmission from the red mobile suit."

"Put it through."

"Alliance vessel, this Captain Char Aznable of the Zeon Mobile Suit Corps; we will provide an escort to deter further ZAFT attacks, so maintain course for the rendezvous point."

"Understood; we appreciate the assistance, Captain."

* * *

If the Alliance personnel were surprised by the sight of Zeon mobile sights in action, they were positively floored several hours later by the Gwadan. The giant battleship, a dark majestic red against the stars with sunlight glinting off of the gold of the Zabi Dynasty crest, escorted by several mobile suit squads, was truly a sight to behold, at least for the Alliance. Not so much for the Zeon, for while the Gwadan truly was a magnificent vessel, they also remembered that the old Earth Federation had their own super-ships (albeit not as large as the royal flagship) such as the Ra Cailum or the Dogosse Giar which could give the Gwadan a good run for its money.

Minister Allster definitely felt out of his depth; first with the revelation that the Zeon fielded their own mobile suits which outclassed those of ZAFT (to say nothing of the dreaded possibility that they were dealing with more Coordinators), then the giant Zeon battleship, and finally the reception at the Gwadan's hangar deck. While certainly impressive, the steel helmets of the Zeon infantry and the gold embroidery and black capes of their officers eerily reminded him of both ZAFT and Nazi Germany. He pushed all those things to the back as he and his staff were escorted to the meeting with Zeon's Sovereign, all the while wondering whether or not Zeon's earlier intervention was a good thing or not.

His musings were literally wiped from his head when he entered what he believed to be just another meeting room…which turned out to be a giant throne room. Seated at the far end on a simple yet elegant throne was a young and beautiful red-headed woman in a green military-style uniform with the stylized gold embroidery favoured by Zeon officers, although in place of the black cape (which would have further gold embroidery) she had a simple red cape lacking the gold embroidery of her subordinates.

"Presenting her Highness, the Sovereign of the Principality of Zeon, Mineva Lao Zabi…" A female attendant said formally as Minister Allster and his staff approached the throne and bowed as was protocol when meeting with a foreign sovereign.

"Greetings, Vice-Foreign Minister…" Mineva greeted the man with a welcoming smile. "…I trust your trip wasn't too stressful for you?"

"Tolerable, your Highness…" he replied. "…I must thank you again for the assistance of your military without which I fear we would not have made it this far."

"Indeed; then I shall convey your gratitude to our forces." Mineva said with a nod, before holding out a hand. Another attendant handed her a file, which she gave to the Minister. "I understand you have concerns about our…genetic status, regarding the nature of our intervention. I assure you Minister that Coordinators did not exist in our previous world and their existence was most surprising to us when we arrived in this world."

"I see; I apologize for any offence caused, your Highness."

"None taken Minister, but now onto business; firstly, I have no intention of joining your war against ZAFT. You must understand Minister, that our arrival here was only the result of an accidental failure of our FTL systems. If things had gone as planned, we would be on our way to find a new and peaceful existence in the cosmos away from the bloody hills of Earth, and we have no intention of drowning ourselves in blood yet again. However, we are willing to give certain concessions; for one thing, we are willing to supply your military base on the Moon with non-military manufactures, in exchange for lunar raw materials. As I understand it, your Lunar Base is both a military facility and a city, is it not?"

"No, you are correct. The Lunar Base is both a military facility and a city." Minister Allster said; this was going far better than he had hoped. While the fact that they had no desire to join the Alliance was troublesome, unlike Orb, they weren't simply going to turn a blind eye to the world's situation. "However, if I may be so bold your Highness, I do not believe that to be your only condition from us."

Mineva smiled as she sat back on her throne. "You are correct Minister. I want diplomatic recognition from all Alliance member states, which should be enough to pressure both PLANT and the neutral nations into recognizing us as well. A consulate and a trade mission will be established at the Free City of Copernicus on the Moon, and while entry to Side 3 will be restricted for the foreseeable future, I believe we may be able to come to further terms in the future once this war is over."

"Your Highness, your terms are most generous." Minister Allster said with a nod; Zeon's Sovereign was clearly trying to sit on the fence, but with enough incentives for the Alliance to let the matter go and indirectly pressuring PLANT to recognize Zeon as well out of fear that alienating the newcomers would lead to their aligning with the Alliance. "I do believe my superiors will accept them."

"Very good, Minister." Mineva said, rising from her throne and smoothing out her uniform. "I am pleased we are able to agree at this early stage; would you and your staff care to dine with me Minister?"

"It will be an honour, your Highness."

* * *

A few days later, the PLANT Supreme Council was in an uproar over the diplomatic recognition by the Earth Alliance member-states of the Principality of Zeon, which was quickly followed by the neutral nations. Patrick Zala in particular was seething; he had covertly given the order to Commander Mitchells to ambush the Earth Alliance delegation to ensure that PLANT could contact the newcomers first, but somehow the Alliance had not only managed to fight them off, but also to completely destroy the Mitchells Team. He suspected that Zeon had a hand in it, but ZAFT Intelligence was unable to acquire any further information on the matter; Side 3 was impregnable and shrouded in a communications blackout, although Zeon prospectors were reported to be combing the dark side of the Moon.

"Damn that Mitchells! If he hadn't broken Zeon's terms regarding the negotiations, we might have been able to ensure complete neutrality from the Principality!" the usually reserved and moderate Councillor Canaver raged.

"Commander Mitchells was only acting in our best interests!" Councillor Joule snapped back, rising to defend the late Commander's actions, though she was unaware of Zala's orders. "You cannot deny that if we had solely made contact with the Principality, then perhaps we could have gained some sympathy from them and ensured their support!"

"And now they distrust us for breaking trust!" Councillor Canaver riposted, but before the two women could continue to verbally exchange blows, another Councillor cut in.

"What's done is done; what we need to decide right now is ZAFT strategy."

"I agree…" another Councillor said. "...the Atlantic Federation's Lunar Base is now no longer completely dependent on supplies from Earth with an active source of non-military supplies from the Principality."

"It doesn't matter." Councillor Zala finally spoke up. "Once we take the spaceports on Earth, we can simply blockade the Lunar Base until they surrender."

This statement managed to calm the council down somewhat, and earned Zala a grateful nod from Chairman Clyne, which he graciously returned.

* * *

A/N

Zeon is not about to jump into the war just like that, though that doesn't mean that they won't be building up their power base. Mineva is a Zabi after all, and Dozle's daughter to boot; despite being the nicest among her entire family she'll still be taking advantage of the situation to ensure Zeon military ascendancy as a deterrent, and a means to ensure her mentor's (Char Aznable) ideals – and by extension those of Zeon Zum Deikun - become reality in the Cosmic Era.


	4. Chapter 4

Disclaimer: I do not own any characters, names, and any copyrighted material used in this work. This is a fanfic, period. Everything belongs to their respective owners. Comments and constructive criticism are all very much appreciated.

Chapter 3: Heliopolis

_Universal Century 101; six months have passed since the space colonies of Side 3 arrived in the Cosmic Era. The Principality has thus far maintained its neutrality, although it maintains a controversial trading arrangement with the Earth Alliance's Lunar Base, all the while shrouding itself with a veil of deception. But as the eleventh month of the Bloody Valentine War passes, and the turning point steadily approaches, the Principality finds itself increasingly drawn into the world of the Cosmic Era._

* * *

"This had better be good." Mineva growled at her aides as they rushed into her house's dining room where the young woman was enjoying her breakfast. "What's so important that you couldn't wait for me to get to my office or that you couldn't be bothered to send to me via vid-phone?"

Silently, one of her aides handed her a file; sighing, Mineva set down her coffee before taking the file and quickly skimming through it. The irritated look on her face quickly changed to alarm before she burst out "Kaohsiung has fallen! How recent is this information?"

"Well, taking into consideration both N-Jammer and Minovsky Particle interference, then most likely…" an aide began but broke off as Mineva stood and walked over to a window.

"ZAFT intends to trap the Naturals on Earth…" she said softly. "…but the Coordinators lack evolutionary potential. It seems to me, seeing as Humanity's souls are even more weighed down by gravity here, we have a lot more work to do than I initially thought."

* * *

Meanwhile, on the other side of the Earth Sphere, aboard the ZAFT Nazca-class Destroyer Vesalius, Commander Rau Le Creuset floated back into the centre of the bridge. "What's with the troubled look, Ades?"

"I still think we should wait for further orders from the Supreme Council."

"It's too late for that." Rau responded, sending several pictures to his subordinate. "The Earth Forces' new mobile weapons; we have to move quickly before they can be taken away from here."

Even as he said those words, several transports wrapped in shock-absorbing balloons and moving on inertial thrust dropped down onto Heliopolis. Immediately after touch down, ZAFT soldiers in normal suits emerged, and after spending a few minutes performing last-minute equipment checks, headed towards a secured hatch leading into the spaceport's restricted sections. Surprisingly (or not considering Orb's technology level) it took a few more minutes for the ZAFT virus to shut down the security systems and to allow the ZAFT infiltrators to enter the hatch.

* * *

Meanwhile, on the other side of the colony, a pair of green and black Jagd Dogas soared towards Heliopolis on inertial thrust. Aboard one of the Jagd Dogas, Lieutenant Banagher Links was caught off guard when he felt something tugging on his senses, causing him to look around the star-scape in surprise. "Who was that just now?"

* * *

In Heliopolis' spaceport, Lieutenant Mu La Flaga was overseeing the maintenance of his Mobius Zero when he felt something tug at his mind. "Le Creuset…no, it's something else. But what or who is it?"

* * *

Aboard the Vesalius, Rau was sitting in the bridge when he felt something tug at his mind, causing him to look around in surprise.

"Is something wrong, Commander?" Captain Ades asked in concern.

"No, it's probably nothing." Rau replied; it felt like Mu, but somehow he knew it wasn't. In any case, he also knew somehow that what he sensed wasn't a threat, so he decided to leave it be and to focus on his current mission.

* * *

Banagher quickly sent a message via optical communication to his wingman. "Did you sense that?"

"Yes…two of them I think." Ensign Aki Kamaitachi answered in the same manner.

"_Newtypes here; how interesting…both Mineva and Captain Char will need to know about this._" Banagher mused, but quickly pushed it to the back of his mind as he closed in on Heliopolis. Firing off quick bursts from their manoeuvring jets to slow them down, the two Jagd Dogas landed on Heliopolis near an external airlock. This one was routinely used by civilian personnel to inspect the outer hull for damage, so it wasn't secured. Strapping on a jet pack and opening his cockpit, Banagher used a hand laser to send a message to Aki. "Keep an eye on my unit."

"Understood…" her Jagd Doga's eye flashed the reply back.

Floating over to the airlock, Banagher tapped in the stolen access code allowing him to open, enter, and pressurize the airlock without tripping an alarm. Floating through several hallways and up an access tunnel, all the while keeping his pilot suit sealed despite the pressurized environment, Banagher found himself before a locked pressure door that led into the colony's interior. Growling as his stolen code failed to unlock the door he affixed a piece of plastic explosive onto the lock and set a timer. Double-checking his side-arm and other equipment one more time, he armed the bomb before returning and taking cover behind the last corner just seconds before the bomb exploded and blew the door open.

Heading to the jagged hole in the wall, Banagher adjusted his jetpack to the colony's air pressure before flying out towards the colony's central cable assembly – a feat that took a quarter of an hour to achieve. He finally reached it as the first explosions from the spaceport rocked the colony.

"ZAFT's begun their capture operation it seems." He growled, taking out his binoculars and began to look around him. After several minutes of fruitless searching, he found what he was looking for, a military convoy escorting several skeletal mobile suit containers. "Amazing…" he said, as began to take pictures with his binocular's camera function. "…Gundams and three of them to boot; strange, the data said there'd be five. Are the other two not here yet?"

Banagher's attention was further piqued by the arrival of two GINN mobile suits which quickly demolished the military convoy, allowing ZAFT infiltrators to launch a drop assault and move to capture the Alliance Gundams.

"Not bad at all…" Banagher said with genuine respect in his voice. "…although I can't help but feel as though I'm watching the early stages of the Battle of Side 7 play out right in front of me." As the battle petered out and the three Gundams and one of the GINNs flew off, Banagher moved to another vantage point from where he could view and record the activities of the other GINN and the infiltrators who broke away from the main group earlier on. He was not to be kept waiting for long, as the Aegis and the Strike emerged from the explosion of a large building. The former landed near the GINN while the latter landed clumsily nearby and staggered away.

"Hey, hey, what's with that pilot?" Banagher complained. "It's like he or she doesn't know how to pilot the unit properly." He continued to watch and record as the GINN drew its sword and assaulted the Strike and was shocked at how the mobile suit changed colour and blocked the assault. "What the hell was that; conformal shielding of some kind?"

As the Aegis launched and left the combat zone, Banagher lowered his binoculars and closed his eyes, reaching out with his powers. "Aki, can you hear me?"

"Yes, what do you need sir?"

"Send an optical communication to the ship and have them provide support. One of the Gundams is leaving the colony unescorted. Capture it, but make sure to minimize the damage as much as possible."

"Yes sir." Aki turned her mobile suit and sent a message via optical communications back to their ship. In response, the Endra-class Cruiser hiding behind several dummy asteroids some distance from Heliopolis fired an M-Missile to disrupt electromagnetic signatures in the vicinity of the spaceport, even as Aki deployed a dummy asteroid to hide behind and with a short burst from her engines to provide the initial thrust, headed for the spaceport.

Meanwhile Banagher continued to watch and record the battle, and was rather shocked to see the Strike's pilot improve his or her performance against the GINN, ultimately disabling it. Unfortunately, the ZAFT pilot managed to escape after setting his unit to self-destruct, knocking the Strike down. Realizing that the battle was over, Banagher stowed his gear and headed back to his unit.

* * *

Hidden behind a dummy asteroid, Aki and her Jagd Doga coasted through space and watched the spaceport for any sign of a Gundam. She was not kept waiting for long as a red and black Gundam flew out into space. "There you are." She hissed as she launched her funnels and launched from behind the dummy asteroid.

Athrun Zala was busy reminiscing about his childhood with Kira and trying to reason out how and why he was with the Earth Alliance when the Aegis shook violently and began to lose speed. At the same time, several alarms began to go off and screens flashed red. "The engines were destroyed?" he said in disbelief, before a mobile suit appeared in front of him to his surprise. It fired something at him and at first he thought he was going to die but nothing happened…when immediately afterwards, he felt the Aegis begin to move. Realization hit him like a bullet: he'd been captured. He immediately tried to escape, but discovered to his horror that the hatch was jammed, probably by something the mobile suit launched at him. Resigned to his fate and exhausted by the many shocks of the day, he sat back in the cockpit and wondered who was behind this.

A quarter of an hour later, Aki's Jagd Doga landed in the Endra-class' hangar with the captured and disabled Aegis. A few minutes later, Banagher returned in his Jagd Doga.

"Hurry and close the hatch so we can pressurize the hangar deck!" an NCO shouted irritably. Once pressurization was done, Aki opened and left the cockpit before removing her helmet with a sigh, shaking her dyed purple hair loose.

"Good work, ensign." Banagher said, floating closer and tossing her a drink. "By the way, that was good thinking using birdlime to prevent the pilot from escaping."

"Thanks lieutenant. Unfortunately for the tech crews though, they'll have to pry it off before they can get the pilot out."

"True; but at the very least, that Gundam is largely intact. Once we get it back to Side 3, we can get a good look at how far Orb and the Alliance have come regarding their mobile suits."

* * *

"Athrun is MIA?" Yzak asked a devastated and despondent Nicol, aghast at the news; despite their rivalry, he still counted Athrun as a friend and didn't want to see him dead.

"Yes; both the Vesalius and the Gamow detected a thermo-spike consistent with an explosion near the spaceport; given the elapsed time after he left Miguel, then…"

"No way…Athrun…but how?" a shocked Dearka stammered out.

"The self-destruct system…" Yzak growled, his fists clenched in fury. "…Athrun's unit must have a secondary failsafe our units lacked. There is no way Athrun is stupid enough not to disarm the self-destruct…damn Naturals!"

* * *

"Excellent work, the two of you." The Endra-class' captain said, nodding to Aki and Banagher before returning his attention to the recorded data with great interest. "Along with the captured Alliance Gundam, all this will be a goldmine for our intelligence operations."

"Thank you very much sir." The two pilots chorused. The captain turned off the recording before turning to the rest of the bridge crew.

"All hands, prepare for immediate launch. We're returning to Side 3."

"Captain…" a crewman called out. "…we've detected some sort of explosion along one of the colony's walls. We also detected something that may have been mobile suits."

"It looks like ZAFT aren't going to let that fifth Gundam go." Banagher said. "They'll either capture or destroy it with a massive offensive."

"So it would seem." The captain said, thinking deeply. Finally, he made a decision and said "Belay my previous orders, and standby." Turning to the two pilots, he said "The two of you standby in your units."

"Yes sir!" the two of them saluted before turning and leaving the bridge, while the captain sat down in the command chair and waited for the outcome of the battle. About half an hour later, the captain found himself rising out of his chair in shock as Heliopolis launched countless escape pods even as it literally fell apart.

"No way; Heliopolis collapsed…"

* * *

A/N

Yes, Athrun has been captured. No, he won't die, but I have plans for him. In the future, it will be Yzak who'll try and avenge Nicol, be captured by Orb, and then get released to ZAFT. Dearka still gets captured as per canon. Lacus and Kira still go their way in canon, although Athrun as an individual won't be a factor.

Aegis has been captured and will be dissected by the Principality, although it won't be of much use for them. Phase-Shift, while an interesting ability, won't really impress the Principality; Minovsky Particles are more effective ECMs and ECCMs than N-Jammers, as such missiles aren't very effective and beam weapons are given greater priority. Not to mention it's not cost-effective to mass produce, so it's of not much use other than as a curiosity.

The transformation systems aren't anything new to the Principality, given their experiences in the Gryps War and the First Neo Zeon War (Gaza-C, Gabthley, etc.).


	5. Chapter 5

Disclaimer: I do not own any characters, names, and any copyrighted material used in this work. This is a fanfic, period. Everything belongs to their respective owners. Comments and constructive criticism are all very much appreciated.

Chapter 4: Rescue and Quattro

"A space colony was destroyed…her Highness will not be pleased." The Endra-class' captain said unhappily. There were precious few Natural space colonies, and while the Sovereign had nothing against Coordinators in particular, she feared that if the Coordinators were allowed to gain sole control of space, the whole of Humanity would pay the price for it.

"At the very least sir, the whole population seems to have escaped to safety." A subordinate said.

"That is small comfort. They'll have no choice but to go back to Earth, given the nature of Orb's neutrality. At the very least, the destruction of the colony due to a ZAFT military operation will be a disaster to Zeon-PLANT relations, and even more so for PLANT-Orb relations." The captain sighed before barking out new orders. "Our mission's been completed, so prepare to move out once we re-orient our current position."

"Captain, we're picking up a signal from somewhere nearby."

"What kind of signal?"

"It appears to be a standard civilian distress signal, most likely from a disabled civilian escape pod."

The captain sighed; this mission was becoming increasingly complicated. Originally their orders were to observe and assess ZAFT's performance in their capture operation, as well as to capture one of the Alliance Gundams (the existence of which had caused quite a stir in Deikun City) if possible. But naval protocol demanded that all Zeon Navy vessels to assist civilians in distress, mission secrecy be damned.

"Can we find it from here?"

"Negative sir; between our own Minovsky Particle interference and ZAFT/Alliance N-Jammers, plus the heat radiating from the ruins…"

"Have Lieutenant Banagher launch immediately. Have him locate the source and report on the situation."

* * *

Banagher slowly flew through the debris field, searching for the source of the signal, all the while unhappily contemplating the ruins of Heliopolis. Heliopolis was an O'Neill cylinder, and very much resembled his old home colony in Side 1, and even more uncomfortably, his current home in Side 3. He pushed the morbid thoughts aside and moved his Jagd Doga behind a piece of debris as he spotted the disabled escape pod and more importantly, the Gundam beside it.

He narrowed his eyes as he spotted the additional equipment strapped to the Gundam; they weren't there when he had watched that Gundam in action during the battle in Heliopolis.

"_Is that Gundam designed to be equipped with a variety of equipment for various situations?_" he mused, even as the Gundam grabbed the pod and took it elsewhere. Pondering for a moment, he stealthily moved his Jagd Doga to follow. After several minutes of flight, he hid behind another piece of debris with a gasp: the Gundam had taken the escape pod to a ship, and not just another ship: it was a virtual carbon copy of the so-called Trojan horse, the White Base.

"The White Base…is this supposed to some kind of joke?" he asked rhetorically and not for the first time he thought that the whole situation was very much like the Battle of Side 7 back during the Universal Century's One Year War. As the Alliance Gundam entered one of the hangars, Banagher nodded before returning.

* * *

Two hours later, Ensign Aki was shadowing the Archangel while creatively hiding behind several dummies and pieces of debris. Lieutenant Banagher wasn't the only one who noticed the similarities between recent events and the Battle of Side 7, and the captain in particular was certain that they were headed for the nearby Eurasian asteroid fortress of Artemis, which was another uncomfortable parallel to the Universal Century, seeing as both Heliopolis and Artemis were in the same general location as Side 7 and Luna II were in the Universal Century.

And so, she had been ordered to escort them to Artemis while avoiding detection, as the captain feared that ZAFT would ambush them (and thus endanger the civilians aboard) en route to the fortress. Which was easier said than done of course; once they had left the bulk of the debris field behind them, she had to make creative use of dummies and what few pieces of debris there were to avoid detection.

Thankfully though, ZAFT didn't seem to be pursuing, and so she amused herself by sending enticing mental images to the Newtype aboard the Alliance vessel. The Newtype didn't seem to have full control or awareness of his abilities, and as such could only respond by communicating a sense of annoyance and displeasure, to which she responded with amusement. However, all good things must eventually come to an end, and even as Aki began to think she just might finish this mission without having to fight, she sensed another Newtype, one with a definitely hostile mentality, even as her unit's sensors picked up another vessel outflanking the Archangel and moving to overtake and cut off the vessel before they could reach the relative safety of Artemis.

"Of course…" she muttered as she quietly manoeuvred her unit to a safer distance. "…I just had to hope this would go off without a hitch."

* * *

"The Mobius Zero has arrived on the catapult deck…linear catapult voltage is rising…unit stabilized in linear field…launch preparations complete…Lieutenant La Flaga is clear for launch." Miriallia said as Mu's mobile armour moved into launch position and the external doors slid open.

"Roger; Mu La Flaga, Mobius Zero, launching!" Mu responded while bracing himself against the intense G-Forces of launch.

"_Good luck, hotshot._" A woman's voice spoke to him in his head. While he would normally freak out as a result of hearing a disembodied voice in his head, Mu was by no means stupid. The rather vivid images which had distracted him while overseeing the repairs to his mobile armour…and the sense of amusement that wasn't his own but he had felt over the rather 'enticing' images…someone out there was playing with his and her minds. And now he knew who.

"_Do you mind?_" he asked, silently casting the thought back even as he manoeuvred to an intercept course for the ZAFT warship to the front of the Archangel. "_I'm not averse to some feminine company, but please don't distract me while I'm busy, or especially when I'm flying on the battlefield._"

There was a moment of silence before the sullen reply ghosted back. "_You can talk to me now?_"

"_Yes, I can._"

"_Yeah, sorry about that, but escort duty is rather boring._"

"_Why are you helping us?_" Mu asked bluntly.

"_You have civilians aboard; the captain was a veteran of the Battle of Side 5, and he didn't want any more dead civilians during his watch._"

"_Side 5…you're from the Principality aren't you?_"

"_If I say yes, will you tell anyone?_"

"_No…_" Mu replied firmly. "_…if I said that I spoke telepathically with a Zeon pilot, they'd probably have me committed. But in exchange, would you mind telling me how I'm doing this_?"

"_Fair enough…_" the pilot conceded. "_…we're called Newtypes, the next stage of Human evolution, and our abilities are a natural adaptation from living in the environment of space. In addition to telepathy, other abilities of ours include, but are not limited to, faster reflexes and increased spatial awareness._"

"_I see…well, that explains a few things._" Mu conceded, remembering the skills he and his late comrades needed to possess to pilot the famed Mobius Zero mobile armours. "_Alright, I'll trust you for now, so would you mind keeping an eye on Kira and the Archangel for me? The kid's a bit inexperienced and…_"

"_Say no more…_" the pilot replied cheerfully. "_Just concentrate on attacking that ship to the front._"

* * *

As she disconnected her mind from Mu's, she turned back to the Archangel, which was steadily firing off ordnance and artillery to keep the captured Gundams at bay. "Impressive…they have a lot of ordnance to spare." She commented. "Though that's not worth much in a Minovsky Particle-rich environment, while their artillery seems to barely have the range to compete with most ship-grade Mega Particle Cannons."

She noted the skill of the ZAFT pilots with approval, seeing that they were up to Zeon standards. The pilot of the Alliance Gundam though, Kira or something, was somewhat lacking, or so it seemed to her, most of his shots going wild or following a simple and easily evaded firing pattern. "Inexperienced brat…" she muttered, thinking Kira was one of those hastily trained pilots, not knowing that the boy had been forced to become a pilot without any sort of military training whatsoever. "…three against one; boy, at this rate you're practically begging for me to interfere."

* * *

Rau sat in his command chair and smiled as the Alliance warship finally came into the Vesalius' firing range. "Main cannons prepare to fire…" his subordinate and the Vesalius' captain Ades ordered. "…standby on laser range-finders."

"It's over…" he began to think when he felt something…or someone sneak up on the ship from below. "Belay that, and execute evasive manoeuvres immediately!" he shouted, causing Ades to look at him in surprise, when a crewman said in alarm "We have a mobile armour closing from below!"

"Activate the CIWS…!" he began to order, but it was too late. At that moment, Mu brought his mobile armour up ninety degrees, before launching his gun-pods and having them fire on a single point to at least superficially weaken the armour before he fired his linear cannon, rupturing the Vesalius' main engines. As the Vesalius began to list and lose power, Mu let out a victory shout even as he launched a cable and used it to slingshot his unit away from the stricken warship at high speed.

"Enemy mobile armour has retreated…main power failing…main engines are offline…" the bridge crew reported one after another.

"Shoot it down!" Ades roared, but was countermanded by Rau.

"We're withdrawing! Issue the retreat signal!"

"Commander, we have a high-energy reading detected from dead ahead!" a crewman shouted in panic.

"Engines to full…" Rau shouted with a wave of an arm. "…evade it!"

Its auxiliary engines burning bright, the Vesalius barely dodged, but took serious damage along the starboard side from the Archangel's positron barrage. Seeing the damage, Mu clenched a fist triumphantly even as a thought ghosted in from the Zeon pilot. "_Not bad at all old man._"

"_Who are you calling an old man?_" Mu complained. "_That's Lieutenant Mu La Flaga to you little girl._"

"_Sorry, but in that case it's not little girl either: it's Ensign Aki Kamaitachi…uh oh. Hang on your friend is in a bit of a tight spot._"

* * *

Aki smiled somewhat cruelly as she launched her funnels; just moments ago, the conformal shielding on the Alliance Gundam had failed causing the pilot to break and flee as another Gundam closed in with a pair of beam sabres drawn.

"This is the end!" Yzak shouted, as he swung his sabres…only to shout incoherently as the Duel shook violently as yellow beams blew off its arms at the elbows.

"What?" Dearka said in surprise just before more beams blew off the Buster's head and missile pods, along with the Blitz' right arm.

"Damn it…we have to retreat, Yzak, Dearka!" Nicol shouted, piloting the Blitz towards the blinded Buster and dragging it back to the Gamow with the Duel flying close behind.

As she retrieved her funnels and flew back to her ship, Aki smirked and flashed a victory sign as she heard Yzak spitting out oaths like melon seeds over the ZAFT channel. Elsewhere, Mu chuckled at the Zeon pilot's antics and said "Right back at you ensign: not bad at all."

* * *

Meanwhile on Earth, three girls chatted animatedly with each other as they walked down a hallway in Morgenroete's central facility in the Orb Union. They were the so-called 'Astray Girls': Asagi Caldwell, Juri Wu Nien, and Mayura Labatt, and they were wondering what was so important that they were being called in on what was supposed to be their day off from training and testing.

To their surprise, there were only a few people in the facility, including Senior Engineer Erica Simmons, who was standing on a raised and stepped platform beside a large, rectangular container speaking with a blonde-haired man wearing the standard Morgenroete uniform, though strangely enough the man was wearing sunglasses indoors.

"Oh good, you finally got here." Erica said, noticing the girls and turning towards them, the blonde man doing likewise. "What you're about to hear is not to leave this facility, do you understand?"

"Yes ma'am." The three girls chorused as the security doors were closed, though that wasn't unusual given the sensitive nature of much of the work going on in the facility.

"Good…" Erica said, nodding. "…I'm sure that you've heard rumours that the Principality of Zeon has its own mobile suits which can be piloted by Naturals. And I'm here to tell you…that those rumours are correct."

As the girls gasped in surprise, Erica continued. "The mechanical systems of their units are actually deceptively simple, and surprisingly advanced, so much so that computer control is not needed to the same degree as ours do. We're already working to try and reverse-engineer the technology, but it will take some time to refit our existing units. Until then, you'll be working with a new set of simulator programs, after which, well…in any case, allow me to introduce to you Lieutenant Quattro Bajeena from the Zeon Mobile Suit Corps."

At this, Lieutenant Quattro stepped forward and nodded, removing his sunglasses as he regarded the three girls.

"Once your units have been refitted with the UC AMBAC system, he'll be overseeing your practical training and with that said…" she broke off as she pulled out and pressed a remote which slowly opened the container beside them. Most of the people present gasped at the sight of the mono-eyed, crested, red and maroon mobile suit which stood in the container.

"…MS-06S Zaku II Commander Type. An outdated mobile suit by current standards, but in its day this unit was a feared force on the battlefield. Especially these colours…from what I hear, these were the colours of Zeon's legendary 'Red Comet' Char Aznable." Turning to Quattro, she asked "Is there any particular reason why you have his colours, lieutenant? Was he a friend of yours, perhaps?"

Quattro smiled a wintery, but friendly smile before he put his sunglasses back on. "Well yes, I suppose you could say I was good friends with Char."

* * *

A/N

For those not in the know, the Battle of Side 5 is also known as the Battle of Loum. And if you don't know who Quattro Bajeena is, then why are you even interested in the UC?


	6. Chapter 6

Disclaimer: I do not own any characters, names, and any copyrighted material used in this work. This is a fanfic, period. Everything belongs to their respective owners. Comments and constructive criticism are all very much appreciated.

Chapter 5: Zeon's machinations

The Zanzibar-class entered the Earth's atmosphere, its lower hull glowing red as it endured the heat of re-entry. In the hangar, three pilots sat in their Doms' cockpits waiting for re-entry procedures to finish.

"So, is there any chance for us to get some shore leave while we're on the surface?" one of the pilots asked.

"Get real…" another pilot, a woman this time, replied. "…we don't have much time left before ZAFT begins their assault on the Victoria spaceport. We have our work cut out for us delaying and ensuring that operation gets as bloody as possible for ZAFT."

"Heads up you two…" the squad leader, also a woman, said. "…our first target is thirty minutes away from the landing zone. It's a major communications relay for ZAFT and their African allies; due to ZAFT's widespread deployment of N-Jammers across the Earth, even their forces are hamstrung regarding long-range wireless communications. We take out that relay, and we shatter the ZAFT logistics and communications network across East Africa."

"At least they have long-range wireless communications." The other woman sneered. "For us it's all but impossible thanks to the Minovsky Effect."

"Save your bitching…" the squad leader chided. "…for after we get the job done."

"Warrant Officer Hale and company…" the Zanzibar-class' captain informed all the Dom pilots over the communications line. "…re-entry procedures have been completed, and we are approaching the landing zone in the Atlas Mountains. Standby…"

"Hale Team, acknowledging." The warrant officer replied, before addressing her subordinates. "Alright, you heard the captain. Commence final weapon checks."

"Scattering Beam Guns…check."

"360mm Bazookas…check."

"My 120mm checks out."

"Heat Sabres are also clear."

"Hover jets and fusion plants all check out."

"Fuel mix is optimal."

"Panoramic monitors are clear."

"Discharge papers?" Warrant Officer Hale joked, causing her fellow pilots to laugh. "Final preparations complete."

"Roger; standby for final approach." The pilots looked up as the hangar doors slid open, revealing the bright yellow landscape stretching out to the horizon under the brilliant blue sky. Hale moved first, piloting her Dom towards the edge of the deck, her other pilots close behind her. "We have reached optimum altitude; all Doms are clear for drop off."

"Roger; let's go you two!" she said, before she jumped off the Zanzibar-class followed by the others. They dropped to the ground, their fall broken by their hover jets, and after a few moments, the three units headed in the direction of the ZAFT base, their passage marked by a plume of sand displaced by their jets.

* * *

"Finally, we're home." Aki said as she floated on the viewing deck, watching the walls of the colony's spaceport slide by as their Endra-class slowly moved towards its assigned dock.

"Well, aren't you eager to see your boyfriend, ensign?" Banagher said with a mocking smile as he sat reading a magazine nearby.

"I don't have a boyfriend."

"Of course not…" Banagher replied, nodding sagely. "…you swing the other way. Sorry for forgetting."

"I…I do not!" Aki spluttered as her face turned red. "Just because all my flatmates are girls and some of them happen to be lesbian doesn't mean I am one too!"

Banagher laughed before setting down the magazine and standing up. "Relax ensign, I was just joking."

Coughing a few times to regain her composure, Aki finally asked "So, you want to catch a bite to eat or something?"

"Sorry Aki…" Banagher said with an apologetic expression on his face as he floated over to the door. "…but I have other business to attend to. Feel free to enjoy yourself though."

"Roger that, lieutenant." She said, giving a mock salute.

* * *

"The Indra has docked?" Mineva asked from behind her desk. "I see…in that case, I need to get going."

"Go?" her secretary, Christina Pieta said in surprise. "Go where?"

"To Central Hospital; I knew the Indra would be arriving today, which is why I came here in civilian wear as opposed to my usual uniform." Which was true; Mineva wasn't wearing her usual military-style uniform, but a green and white blouse and skirt, white knee socks, and soft, black leather shoes. "Banagher will be meeting me there." She said, putting on a white cardigan.

"But your Highness…" Christina began to protest but Mineva cut her off.

"We took a great risk sending the Indra out on that mission; give the crew shore leave, and I want a condensed report regarding all our findings as soon as possible. And regarding that ZAFT prisoner, tell Colonel Handers that if his little project blows up in our faces, I'm going to have him shot."

"But your Highness…" Christina wailed, chasing after the Sovereign as she walked out of her office towards the elevator. "…at least tell me why you're going to the hospital."

"Just a check-up; I've been along for four months after all." Mineva said, unconcerned by her secretary's worries.

"Along…four months…your Highness…!" the secretary gasped out, aghast by the revelation. "But you're not married yet!"

Mineva rolled her eyes in response and entered the elevator as the doors opened. "Big deal; my relationship with Banagher isn't even an open secret anymore, and we can get married once things settle down. Keep this a secret, Christina, or I'll have your job."

* * *

Athrun Zala had a bad week, though to be honest, he wasn't even sure if it was a week as his captors used a different calendar. First, his friend and fellow pilot Rusty got killed. Then he discovered that Kira had never gone to PLANT as he had thought, but was on Heliopolis, and had gotten caught in the middle of the crossfire between ZAFT and the Earth Alliance. And that was assuming he wasn't with the Alliance to begin with. Then to top it all off, he had been captured by the Principality of Zeon.

That was quite perplexing to him; Zeon was officially neutral in the war, much like Orb, but was more sympathetic to the Alliance than to PLANT. It was absurd; Earth had launched nuclear missiles against PLANT, and even though ZAFT had triggered an energy crisis to cripple Earth's economy, it was still unthinkable that Zeon were slightly more supportive of Earth than of PLANT.

He had asked Commander Le Creuset of course; the man had explained that apparently the Principality believed that Humanity's destiny lay in space and that therefore they should all leave Earth for space, and as such they favoured the Alliance because they feared that in the worst case scenario the Coordinators would imprison the rest of Humanity on Earth permanently. And that troubled Athrun, because while he and most others would never condone such a course of action, his father and many other Coordinators would probably be ready and willing to do such a thing, assuming they didn't just commit genocide against the people of Earth.

At the very least though, his captors treated him humanely, as his food was solid and wholesome – as to be expected from military rations – and was provided regularly along with clean drinking water. He was also regularly escorted to the toilet, and upon extraction from the disabled Aegis, he had been given a thorough medical check-up.

Once he had asked a friendlier guard why he had been captured; the guard had replied that they wanted to see what the new Alliance Gundams were capable of, and that his (Athrun's) capture had just been coincidence, as any pilot would have done. The guard had then assured him that he would be treated fairly, and then gave him his food.

Athrun sighed as he put the last of his food into his mouth. He had overheard the guards saying that they would be arriving in Side 3 shortly, so Athrun reasoned out that he would soon be transferred to a more secure facility, where he would probably be interrogated. Muttering about the unfairness of life, he wondered how he was going to get home. He was still wondering that when the drugs in his food finally took hold and he fell asleep.

When he opened his eyes next, he was naked and bound on an operating table, while men wearing smocks and surgical gloves, masks, and goggles stood around him. He tried to think, but was unable to get past the fog clouding his mind.

"The subject has awakened; apply the anaesthesia." The surgeon said, causing a nurse to pick up a mask and attach it to his face. After a few more moments, he began to black out, even as the surgeon picked up a gleaming scalpel…

* * *

On the Moon, a pair of Zeon prospectors stood on a ridge and looked out over a vast plain stretching out towards the lunar horizon. "Is this it?" one of them asked.

"That's right. This is it." The other replied.

"There's nothing here."

"Of course there's nothing here; Granada was never built in this world. But that's going to change, and soon."

"This is going to be prime estate, you realize? A lot of people are going to be queuing up to buy property here once the first stage of development is complete."

"Of course I know that! What do you take me for? I'm more concerned what the Senate and the Sovereign are planning. Something tells me that rebuilding Granada is simply part of a bigger plan."

"What's this? Are you saying that you've become a Newtype all of a sudden?"

"Of course not; I'm just…oh never mind. Let's go back to the outpost and report on our findings."

"Yeah: the Granada plain is empty and ready for development. Nice and easy…"

"Winston, that attitude of yours is going to get you into trouble one of these days, you mark my words."

* * *

The three Doms sped across the desert at great speed, their passage marked by a massive plume of displaced sand behind them.

"You do realize we don't have M-Missile support at this distance from the ship, right Warrant Officer?"

"Of course I do." Hale responded to her subordinate's question. "That's why I brought along an old fashioned jammer to make sure they don't call for help while we go in fast and hard."

"They'll still realize something is off once the airwaves are filled with static."

"I know…" Hale broke off as she saw the ZAFT communications relay rise out of the horizon. Without skipping a beat, she shouldered her bazooka, aimed at the centre of the central antenna assembly and fired. The rocket soared through the air and struck true, blowing the assembly in half. The upper half toppled to the ground even as ZAFT and African Community soldiers scrambled around in panic. The lower half simply collapsed into itself.

The three Doms broke up and circled the scene; Hale fired off another round, and destroyed the motor pool and all of the enemy's linear tanks and personnel transport vehicles. Seaman Cassandra meanwhile riddled the buildings with her 120mm machine gun, leaving death and destruction in her wake. One ZAFT BuCue emerged from a hangar and charged at Cassandra, who fired her scattering beam gun, blinding the unit. Before it could recover she hovered over to the side and stabbed the BuCue with her heat sabre, then blasted off to a safe distance before it exploded. Another BuCue tried to leave a hangar, but a direct hit from Seaman Henkel's bazooka destroyed its head and sent it crashing back into the hangar and a third BuCue. Two more rockets later – one from Henkel and another from Hale – and the hangar and both BuCues were reduced to a pile of scrap metal.

The three Doms assembled in the middle of the ruins and deactivated their hover jets. As they surveyed the scene, Cassandra noticed surviving ZAFT and African soldiers fleeing the combat zone. She raised her machine gun but was stopped by Hale.

"Let them go, the desert will kill them for us. Let's go back for now."

* * *

A young man with navy-blue hair and green eyes awoke in his hospital bed squinting at the light pouring in through his window. As he sat up, he winced, and clutched his chest in pain.

"Oh good, you're awake." A doctor said, coming into his room. "I didn't expect you awake so soon, warrant officer. How do you feel?"

"My body hurts all over." He replied and the doctor nodded.

"That's an uncommon but not unknown symptom of cryogenic stasis. As is a certain degree of memory loss; do you know who you are?"

The young man frowned as he realized he didn't know who he was, or why he was even there. It was a profoundly empty moment, and for a moment he teetered on the brink of insanity…but finally he sighed and looked sharply at the doctor. "No…" he replied. "…but I suppose you can tell me?"

"Correct…" the doctor said, nodding. "…Warrant Officer Murasame Seven. I hate to remind you of your past, but you're a – and I apologize for any offense caused – failed Cyber-Newtype from the Earth Federation's Murasame Institute in Japan. You were captured, or rather, freed from captivity during the First Neo Zeon War, and joined our forces in gratitude. However, the strain of all the experiments took their toll, and as such you were placed in cryogenic stasis until a medical solution could be found."

"And that is why I'm here now…" Murasame said, nodding as he did so. It fit, and his mind rejoiced in finally remembering who he was. Of course, not all of his memories would ever return, but he didn't care; as far as he was concerned, the past was unimportant, and he would simply start over from here and now. As he was pondering himself, a nurse came with a folded Zeon uniform and a pair of boots and put it on the bed, before whispering something to the doctor and leaving.

"That's your uniform warrant officer, and someone should come along after a while to escort you to your assigned post." The doctor told him before leaving as well. Wincing at the pain, Murasame stood up and after closing the door (all the while muttering complaints why the doctor couldn't be bothered to close it himself), he took off his smock and began putting on the Zeon uniform, mentally noting to buy new underwear of his own later on. He was putting on his boots when the door opened and a cheerful young woman with orange hair strolled into the room, her cape flowing around her.

"Hello there, warrant officer. I'm Sub-Lieutenant Elpeo Ple the Third, and I'm going to be flying with you on the battlefield." She happily introduced herself with a mock salute. "Anyway, it's nice to meet another Cyber-Newtype; the only one I know right now is my sister Marida, so let's try and get along shall we?"

* * *

A/N

Why is Zeon covertly helping the Alliance you ask? Isn't it obvious? They don't want the Coordinators to win and imprison the rest of Humanity on Earth. Of course, opinions change like the seasons, and once Blue Cosmos take over, Zeon's not going to be happy, since they don't really have anything against Coordinators in principle to begin with. And would any of you care to guess 'Murasame Seven' and his true identity? It's quite easy, I assure you.

Oh, and the last part of this chapter takes place about a month after the rest.


	7. Chapter 7

Disclaimer: I do not own any characters, names, and any copyrighted material used in this work. This is a fanfic, period. Everything belongs to their respective owners. Comments and constructive criticism are all very much appreciated.

Chapter 6: Developments

"So, what should I call you?" Warrant Officer Murasame asked Ple Three as they rode a jeep across the military base.

"Hmm…" Ple Three thought for a moment, largely focused on driving the jeep. It wasn't like she was a reckless driver, but her driving could be described as…interesting, even if she hadn't run over someone or wrecked something. "…lieutenant will do while we're on duty. Ple or Elpeo will do when we're off-duty, or when you need to catch my attention. Don't call me by my number though; only my sister calls me that."

"Alright…" Murasame nodded, before continuing. "…I'm guessing that you're the third in a series of Cyber-Newtypes?"

"Close, but incorrect. Actually I'm the third clone of Elpeo Ple. Who wasn't a Cyber-Newtype by the way; from what I know, she was a powerful Newtype. My sister is number twelve. There were originally eleven clones, numbered two to twelve, but apart from myself and Marida, I'm not sure if any of my sisters are still alive."

"You're surprisingly accepting about all this." Murasame noted.

"Well, it's not like getting angry about this will solve anything." Ple Three said, as she drove the jeep sharply around a corner and causing a group of soldiers to jump out of the way. "I could say the same about you. You're quite calm about your situation, and your file even says you don't remember your past."

"True…" Murasame conceded with a shrug. "…but the past is just that: the past. Nothing we do will ever change it. All we can do is to keep on living and hope to atone for our past mistakes in the future."

"My thoughts exactly…" Ple Three replied as she braked suddenly and miraculously ended up parking the jeep perfectly in front of an MS hangar.

"Is there any particular reason your sister has a different name?" Murasame asked, getting out of the jeep and following Ple Three towards the entrance.

"It's a long story, and a rather private one. I'd appreciate it if you didn't ask." She replied after a short pause.

Murasame nodded and said "I understand; sorry for trying to pry."

"It's alright; it's only natural to be curious." Ple Three said, her cheerful demeanour returning as they entered the hangar. "Lieutenant Fran!" she called out, causing a silver-haired woman to look up from across the hangar and the tech crews to look at Ple and Murasame.

Noticing the two of them approach, Sophie Fran walked to meet them after picking up a folder and giving a few words to a technician. "Oh good, you must be Warrant Officer Murasame Seven correct?" she said as she met with the two. "I am Lieutenant Sophie Fran and I will be serving as your commanding officer."

"Warrant Officer Murasame Seven, reporting." Murasame said, giving a salute, which Sophie acknowledged with a nod.

"According to your data, you reacted unexpectedly with the enhancement procedures at the Murasame Institute; as such, while you failed to develop Newtype abilities, your body is much stronger and faster than a normal Human's, so much so that you could be classified as an Augmented Human as opposed to a Cyber-Newtype."

"I see…" Murasame said, unsure about what she was saying.

Sophie nodded before continuing "While this means assigning you a psycommu-equipped unit would be meaningless, your abilities would be wasted on a Geara Doga. As such, you'll be piloting something else."

At that she turned to her right, and following her line of sight, Ple Three whistled and laughed as she saw the mobile armour sitting there before saying "Well now, that's a blast from the past; an ORX-005 Gaplant. One of the fastest transformable mobile suits ever developed."

"And one of the hardest to pilot..." Sophie said seriously. "…seeing as the intense G-Forces of its enhanced speed ensures that only the strongest Humans can endure the strain of piloting the unit."

"It sounds perfect for me then." Murasame said with a faint smile, to which Ple Three eagerly nodded her agreement. "What about you Ple? What's your unit?"

In response, she pointed to the opposite side of the hangar where a white and violet mobile suit with a faintly insect-like appearance was standing. "AMX-004 Qubeley, just like old lady Haman used to pilot."

"And before you ask…" Sophie said, pointing a thumb over a shoulder. "…my unit is over there in the back. It's just a generic Geara Doga, but it's perfect for me. Now then, Ple I'll leave him to you. I have other matters to attend to."

"What…hey wait; what do you mean you have other matters to attend to?"

"The Angrboda returned last night; all squad leaders are getting a briefing over their mission in the next few days." After saying that, she waved a hand, and left the hangar.

Muttering curses under her breath, Ple Three walked towards the Gaplant followed by Murasame, who asked "What's the Angrboda?"

"It's a refitted Zanzibar-class Mobile Cruiser." She replied as they approached the unit. "Officially it was out testing out its systems in the Debris Belt, but rumour has it that it was sent to Earth."

"Why?"

"How would I know?"

"You're a Cyber-Newtype."

"Indeed…" Ple Three replied, smiling happily. "…apparently they've been causing all sorts of shit across ZAFT territory in Africa, and are indirectly responsible for the bloodbath that was the ZAFT assault on the Victoria spaceport. ZAFT won the battle, but it was a pyrrhic victory, and ZAFT only has a tenuous hold on the spaceport."

"How'd they pull that off?" Murasame asked as he dropped down into the cockpit and began a series of standard system diagnostics.

"A series of hit-and-run raids disrupted ZAFT communications across the entire region, and by cutting key supply lines at appropriate times, they not only delayed the ZAFT assault but caused a certain degree of mismanagement and confusion on the ground. If not for the ZAFT drop assault from orbit, the Alliance might have actually wiped out the ground assault and won the battle."

"Ever imagine what it'd be like if we were there?" Murasame asked with a feral smile as the diagnostics finished and he prepared the simulator programs.

Ple Three's smile was just as bloodthirsty as her partner's. "Isn't it obvious? ZAFT would listen and dance to my melody of death."

"My thoughts exactly…"

* * *

A few days later, three ZAFT pilots wearing the red uniforms of elite mobile suit pilots were walking down a corridor leading to Rau's office in ZAFT's Gibraltar base on Earth.

"Ah, it's good to see you again you three." ZAFT Commander Rau Le Creuset greeted the three of them as they entered his office, inwardly puzzled by Yzak's somewhat taciturn appearance. The young man seemed to have changed somewhat, and while he still kept the scar from his little brush with death against the Strike, he seemed calmer and less angry than before.

"I'm here to inform you that despite our bloody losses in South Africa, plans for Operation Spitbreak will continue to be developed with appropriate adjustments." He told them, pushing his concerns for Yzak to the back of his mind. "However, since I'll be busy directing preparations for the operation, I will also be unable to oversee the pursuit of the legged ship…Yzak, are you listening?"

Startled, Yzak quickly gathered himself and bowed in apology. "Please accept my apologies, but I was distracted by that photo on your desk."

"Oh I see…" Rau said, looking at the photo on his desk. "…it was my fault then. Well, since you've already seen it, and it's not really a secret to begin with, I might as well tell you what it is. This is a photo taken by an unmanned reconnaissance probe sent into Side 3, and the only legible one of any use it took. Though to be honest, we're not really sure what it is either."

"It looks some kind of ship with lots of really big external tanks to me…" Dearka said dismissively.

Yzak however, looked closer at the picture. Finally, he asked "What are the chances that Zeon has efficient and effective micro-fusion devices?"

Rau raised an eyebrow in response; that was a question he had not expected from Yzak. Finally, he answered "Quite high, seeing as their tech base is very different from ours."

"Then if I'm right, those are hydrogen tankers." Yzak reasoned out. "The Principality probably has a large store of nuclear fuel, but it won't last forever, so they probably want to secure a supply line to the largest store of free hydrogen in the solar system."

"Jupiter…" Nicol whispered, making the connection even as Dearka's eyes widened in surprise and Rau laughed heartily.

"Mineva Lao Zabi…" he said, calming down. "…that woman undoubtedly deserves her throne. She may be sympathetic to Earth, but all the same she doesn't intend to become dependent on them. Well, we'll worry about her when the time comes; for now, there doesn't seem to be any danger of military technology changing hands between the Alliance and the Principality." Once again regarding Yzak, he made a decision. The boy had changed somewhat, and in ways he had never predicted and still couldn't measure completely, and could possibly be a threat to his plans in the future, but for now he would be quite useful. "More importantly, regarding the pursuit of the legged ship, as I will be unable to oversee it, Yzak you will be in command."

"Congratulations Yzak!" Nicol quickly congratulated his friend, while a smirking Dearka gave him a congratulatory pat on the back. The young man in question, however, just gave a silent salute in response.

* * *

Banagher quickly grew concerned at the violin music that echoed across Mineva's house as he opened and closed the door, as it usually meant she was concerned about something, and she needed to calm herself and her thoughts down. Making his way to the second floor, he found her standing on a balcony with her eyes closed as she played a soft and calming song with her violin.

"Audrey…?" he said, causing her to stop playing abruptly and to open her eyes and to look at him in surprise. He was the only person now who called her that, and the only one who was allowed to get away with it. "Is something wrong?"

"…yeah. There is…" she said, sighing as she sat down and put her violin down on a nearby table. "According to our political analysts, that madman Patrick Zala is all but guaranteed to win in the next elections for the chairmanship of the PLANT Supreme Council."

"What did you see?" Banagher asked, worry obvious on his face; both he and Mineva were powerful Newtypes, and he knew she had seen something.

"I saw the Earth…it was dead." She whispered; her eyes hollow and her face contorted with horror. "The entire planet was burning…somehow I knew that this would Earth's fate if Patrick Zala would get his way."

"But if we join the Earth Alliance, then Blue Cosmos…" Banagher said, but broke off as Mineva looked at him.

"I know, but what are the lives of a few hundred million people in PLANT against the billions on Earth? It's a sadistic choice…but no. Zeon will not join the Alliance; there has to be another way…there just has to be…"

"Audrey…it's going to be alright. I'm sure we'll figure something out. We've done it before." He assured her with a smile while mentally reminding her of Laplace's Box and embracing her from behind, causing her to smile and hope to reappear in her eyes. "You are not alone. Everyone in Zeon is with you, and we have Char with us. Seriously, between the Zabi Dynasty and Zeon Zum Deikun's son, is there anything we can't do?"

"I suppose not." She answered, looking fondly over her shoulder at Banagher.

* * *

Yzak's transport had left Gibraltar long after Dearka and Nicol had left. Normally, Yzak would have been very irritated at the delay, but after his many brushes with death – he had the scar to prove it – and the loss of so many friends – Rusty, Athrun, Miguel – he began to find himself calmer and less angry about life. He even began to question his own and his mother's Coordinator-supremacist views, something he had never done before. All this was a profoundly confusing moment, and one he intended to silently brood on en route to Carpentaria.

Cagalli, for her part, was increasingly concerned as her damaged Sky Grasper began to run low on fuel and she could still find no sign of the Archangel. Her worrying was cut short when her IFF transponder began to register an unfriendly unit nearby…which was quickly revealed to be a ZAFT transport plane. Quickly manoeuvring her plane as to avoid a collision, she launched an attack, while the transport attempted to defend itself.

Aboard the transport, an irritated Yzak rushed into the cockpit to demand an explanation. "What the hell was that?"

"We're under attack!" one of the pilots told him, even as an explosion rocked the plane.

"That can't be right…we're over the Equatorial Union, and they're neutral…" Yzak began to say when the same pilot from before interrupted him.

"Hurry and get in your unit! We don't have any sub-flight lifters for your unit to fight in the air, and we don't have any DINNs either to counter-attack with! However, we did manage to get a signal off, and considering your unit's abilities, you should be able to survive on your own for a while, at least until a search team gets here! Hurry; if you go down with the plane, then your loss will be a stain on the honour of the supply corps!"

Cursing, Yzak rushed towards the hangar, but respected the pilots' determination and courage under fire. Within minutes, Yzak was in his unit's cockpit, and after several moments had activated his unit and jumped off of the plane and was free-falling down to the ocean below. He didn't see the plane's fate, but he did catch sight of a small island nearby, and used his engines to guide and slow the Duel's descent towards that island. Landing on the coast, he ran a quick check through all the frequencies, and while he was disappointed by the lack of contact from all ZAFT channels, he was satisfied with the lack of all hostile IFFs nonetheless.

Locking down his unit – no harm in being cautious after all – he armed himself and set out to explore the island. Which wasn't much; it barely took a few minutes to traverse it from coast to coast. He was just going to head back when he heard a twig snap behind him. Whirling he caught sight of a wet and surprised blonde boy…holding a gun and wearing a utility vest. Cursing, said boy fired off a shot, which Yzak dodged with ease, but he slipped and lost his gun in the process. Unwilling to confront an armed opponent on their terms, he managed to jump away and hid himself among some rocks as the boy ran forward to pick up his gun.

Growling, he felt the familiar anger rise deep inside him and smiled. It felt good to be back to being his usual irritable self.

* * *

A/N

I'm impressed that a lot of people quickly realized who 'Murasame Seven' really is. No, Murasame is only a Cyber-Newtype in name only, to cover up the fact that he's actually a Coordinator who was used to give Zeon an understanding of how Coordinators 'tick', and as such has had his memories altered accordingly.

Just as Zeon once had no understanding of Phase-Shift and just dismissed it as 'conformal shielding', ZAFT has no understanding of Minovsky Physics and as such do not know that Zeon's nuclear fuel is both Hydrogen and Helium-3.


	8. Chapter 8

Disclaimer: I do not own any characters, names, and any copyrighted material used in this work. This is a fanfic, period. Everything belongs to their respective owners. Comments and constructive criticism are all very much appreciated.

Chapter 7: Not so Different

The blonde boy leapt nimbly down the hill towards the gun the ZAFT pilot had dropped, cautiously knelt down, and slowly picked it up. At the same time, Yzak cautiously peered around the boulder he was hiding behind and carefully watched his opponent make his move. The moment his attention was diverted, Yzak moved quickly and jumped over the rocks and up the hillside and into the shadows under the trees. The boy managed to fire off a couple of shots, but they all went wild, causing Yzak to smile as he drew his combat knife and prepared to turn the tables on his adversary.

Double-checking her weapons, Cagalli ran after the ZAFT pilot, but stopped short before entering the treeline. The ZAFT pilot was probably hiding somewhere in there, and she wasn't keen on facing down a Coordinator on her own. She was still thinking that when the silver-haired pilot jumped down from a branch overhead; dropping down onto a crouch behind her, he swept out her legs from under her causing her to tumble to the ground with an uncharacteristic yelp.

Yzak had to give credit, even knocked to the ground the boy refused to give up and aiming a gun at him with speed born of desperation. But while it was impressive, it wasn't enough against a trained Coordinator, as Yzak quickly kicked the gun out of the boy's hand before he dove down and drove an elbow into the boy's gut, pinning him to the ground. Almost simultaneously, he raised his other hand and moved to deliver the killing blow…only for the 'boy' to scream with an unmistakably feminine voice, shutting down Yzak's battle fury and replacing it with shock and surprise.

Regarding his gasping opponent closely, he finally noticed her all but unnoticeable bust through the unflattering utility vest she wore.

"Enough already!" she screamed at him.

"Y-you're a girl?" he asked in response, causing the girl to bristle.

"Of course I am! What did you think I was all this time?" she replied, outraged by the insinuation. Yzak raised an eyebrow, unimpressed by her bluster but impressed by the fact that she could feel more than fear in this situation. Making up his mind, he quickly turned her over and ignoring her protests and threats against any 'inappropriate' behaviour – as if he would ever allow himself to sink that low – he tied up her wrists and ankles securely.

Picking her weapons, he holstered his own gun after checking it over, after which he walked over to a cliff well out of sight, where he threw her gun away into the sea (as well as taking notice of the downed Alliance fighter beached nearby in the shallows). After taking a moment to calm down, he walked back to where the girl was and found her trying to follow him by crawling on the ground like a worm.

"That is absolutely undignified, do you know that?" he calmly observed, crossing his arms and adopting a disapproving expression.

"Only because you tied me up like this!" she raged, causing Yzak to roll his eyes.

"You know, if you actually looked and acted feminine, people wouldn't mistake you for a boy. Somehow I'm sure I'm not the first person to make a mistake regarding your gender." He observed, smiling as she protested angrily. As he watched her splutter out protests and threats, he made a decision. She may have been piloting an Alliance fighter, but she didn't look or even act like an Alliance soldier, which meant she was probably a thief or a deserter or a mercenary. And it wasn't like she was any real threat to him anyway; he may be short-tempered and hateful and discriminatory against Naturals (though his losses were beginning to change that), he still preferred to fight with honour and refused to kill helpless opponents.

Wincing inwardly as he remembered the shuttle he had shot down during the battle against the Alliance 8th Fleet – he was never going to forgive himself for losing himself in the heat of the moment and to his rapidly-cooling desire for vengeance against the Strike and its pilot – he made a decision. Drawing his knife, he knelt down and cut the girl free. Ignoring her expression of puzzlement and surprise, he began to walk back to his unit.

"Hey wait, why…?" she began to ask as she scrambled to her feet before Yzak interrupted her.

"There's no point in keeping you tied up, and I have more important matters to attend to. Do what you want so long as you don't get in my way."

* * *

"What do you mean we've lost Yzak's transport?" Dearka angrily argued with a deck officer in ZAFT's Carpentaria Base.

"Precisely what I said." The officer responded, unimpressed by the pilot's bluster. They were fighting a war after all, and losses like this were fully expected. "We briefly detected a distress signal giving us a general area for his location, but because of our preparations for Operation Spitbreak…"

"So you're just going to leave him for dead is that it?" Dearka roared, outraged by the officer's lack of concern. "ZAFT soldiers watch out for each other…"

"We are fighting a war here young man." The officer coldly interrupted him with a glare. "People die or go missing in war, but their sacrifices will not be forgotten. If you wish to go and look for your friend, by all means do so. But do not expect us to do it for you; we're quite short-handed already following that disaster in South Africa, and as such have our hands full as it is already. Now if you don't mind I have other matters to attend to."

As the officer walked off, Dearka muttered a few curses under his breath before spitting on the ground where the officer had stood. As he began to walk off, he noticed Nicol getting into and activating a one-person helicopter and made a beeline for him.

"Don't try and stop me Dearka." Nicol said firmly from the helicopter as Dearka came within earshot. "We've already lost Rusty, Athrun, and Miguel. I'm not just going to sit back and lose Yzak as well."

"Who said I was going to stop you?" Dearka said with a raised eyebrow and an irritated tone. "I was just going to tell you to wait up since I'm coming with you to look for Yzak."

* * *

"Here you go." Yzak said, handing a mug of rations towards Cagalli, who took it gratefully. The two of them were seated around a fire at the Duel's feet, shielded from the rain by the Duel's shield overhead. "Don't even think that there's anything different between ZAFT and Alliance rations; Coordinator or Natural, we all eat the same food."

"You're unusually generous, considering the generally condescending attitude you've shown to me thus far." Cagalli wryly observed, causing Yzak to smirk.

"I'm turning over a new leaf recently. Though to be honest, I'm still unsure if I should be glad about it or not."

Sipping at their steaming rations, the two of them sat in the awkward silence around the fire. Finally, Cagalli spoke up to ask about something that had been bothering her from the moment she saw Yzak's unit.

"Hey, can I ask you a question?" she asked, causing Yzak to look at her sharply. "That unit…were you among the ones who attacked Heliopolis to get it?"

"And if I was?" he answered with a neutral tone and expression. Before she could retort some sort of high-and-mighty rebuttal, he continued. "Before you tell me that Heliopolis was a neutral colony, let me ask you: how is cooperating with the Alliance to develop prototype mobile suits supposed to be neutral?"

"Well that's…"

"Relax, I'm not condemning you. In fact I understand the reasoning for it: seeing as you seem to be from that nation, could you tell me what Orb's ideals are again?"

Narrowing her eyes in suspicion at that most unexpected of questions, she paused before replying "Orb will not attack another nation, will not allow another nation to attack them, and will not intervene in the conflicts of other nations."

"It's quite a wonderful ideal, actually…" Yzak commented. "…until you see the underlying hypocrisy behind it."

"Hypocrisy…?" Cagalli snarled in anger.

"Basically, it won't matter how many people end up dying in other nations' wars, or what atrocities those nations do, so long as Orb itself is left alone." Yzak said, noting the girl flinch as the words struck her like a blow. "I won't question your country's ideals, or why someone from Orb was piloting an Alliance fighter, but my point is that without the strength to back it up, an ideal is absolutely meaningless. Your country's leaders, or at least some of them, cooperated with the Alliance in the development of prototype mobile suits in order to gain the power to uphold your ideals when the time comes. In that sense, ZAFT, Orb, and the Alliance are no different. We all seek power to protect and uphold our ideals."

"But even so, Heliopolis was…!"

"You still haven't answered my question: how was Heliopolis neutral when the Alliance prototypes were built there?"

As Cagalli subsided and began to brood, Yzak sighed and said "I'm not saying you and your country's ideals are inherently right or wrong, but rather you shouldn't take them and reality at face value. The world isn't a simple place, and it's a rather twisted one, so just take your time and think about it."

"What about you?" Cagalli asked with a challenging tone. "What are your ideals, ZAFT soldier?"

Surprisingly, Yzak didn't answer, not for a long while. "I don't know." Yzak finally replied, causing Cagalli's eyes to widen. "In the past, I would have just simply followed what the PLANT leadership would have decided, but now…after everything that's happened, I can't help but wonder: assuming we win this war and wrest access to space from the Alliance, how long? How long until we become what we fight against? Will I still be proud to call myself a soldier of ZAFT when that time comes?"

Sighing, he tossed a few more logs onto the fire before standing up. "There should be enough logs here to keep the fire going for the rest of the night. Feel free to stay here, but I'm going to stay in my unit. We both have a lot to think about, and what we need to think about has to be done on our own."

As the ZAFT pilot hoisted himself back in his unit, Cagalli found herself thinking about the ZAFT pilot's words; was Orb really no different from the Alliance or from ZAFT considering the underlying hypocrisy of its ideals? Was sacrificing Heliopolis' neutrality and risking the lives of all its citizens worth the hope of gaining the strength to uphold Orb's ideals? Neither the Natural nor the Coordinator realized it, but neither had much sleep that night, troubled as they were by their inner demons.

* * *

ZAFT Commander Rau Le Creuset stepped off of the courier that had carried him halfway across the world from Gibraltar to Carpentaria, and was surprised to find none of his three pilots waiting for him. He supposed they were out pursuing the legged ship, but something told him they were not.

"Where are the members of the Joule Team?" he asked the officer leading the reception party.

"They're out searching for their Commander." The man replied apologetically. "His transport went down over the Eastern Equatorial Union; I told them that we might as well declare him MIA with a war going on and all, but they insisted on searching for him."

Rau simply smiled tolerantly. "Let them do as they please and satisfy their concerns on their own for now." He firmly ordered. "Elsman and Amalfi are both elites, and their judgment can be trusted. If anyone can find Commander Joule, they can. And if he really is dead, then it will teach them something they need to learn on their own about life."

"But sir…" the man persisted, causing Rau to stop walking and to look at him in the eyes.

"Look at it this way…" he explained. "…seeing as Commander Joule is Councillor Joule's only son, if he really is dead, then we can claim to have at least tried to search for him. And if he's alive and was found after you declared him MIA, then at least imagine the resulting backlash from the boy's mother."

As expected, the man paled at the thought of daring a Councillor's wrath, mentally thanking his earlier decision not to stop Elsman and Amalfi from performing a search. Smiling at the man's discomfort, Rau resumed his walk towards the military base.

* * *

"Well girl, did you come to any conclusions last night?" Yzak asked, hefting his helmet over a shoulder and suppressing a yawn.

"No, not really…" she replied, looking as tired and sleep-deprived as he was.

"Good…" he snorted, causing her to glare at him. "…because I wouldn't have believed you if you said you had. And before you ask, no, I did not find my answers either. All of our questions are extremely complex, and the answers would never come to us in one night."

Sighing, he said "Anyway, I've picked up three approaching units; two of them are from ZAFT, and the other one is from the Alliance. I don't know why someone from Orb is with the Alliance, nor do I particularly care, but its best you go back to where your unit is to avoid funny questions for the both of us."

Growling at his condescending attitude, the girl strode off into the trees, and Yzak turned and walked back to the beach. "Hey…!" the girl shouted, causing him to turn in surprise to see her smiling at him from the treeline. "I never did learn your name. Mine's Cagalli; what's yours?"

"Yzak…just Yzak." He said after a moment of open-mouthed surprise, after which Cagalli headed into the trees with a friendly wave. "Annoying woman…" he muttered with a wistful smile as he spotted two approaching ZAFT helicopters. "…but she wasn't what I expected from a Natural…Cagalli, huh?"

Meanwhile, on the other side of the island, Cagalli waved a welcome to Mu's Sky Grasper as it flew over her downed unit and the Strike surfaced out of the sea.

* * *

A/N

Well, there we go. And no, there will be no romance between Cagalli and Yzak. Their relationship – assuming I have them meet again – will be along the lines of vitriolic friends as opposed to star-crossed lovers like Athrun and Cagalli were in canon.


	9. Chapter 9

Disclaimer: I do not own any characters, names, and any copyrighted material used in this work. This is a fanfic, period. Everything belongs to their respective owners. Comments and constructive criticism are all very much appreciated.

Chapter 8: The Land of Peace Part 1

The Archangel staggered over the Pacific, its armour blackened in places and launching missiles and firing its CIWS in desperation against the three ZAFT Gundams circling around it on their Guul sub-flight lifters. Normally, even such an advanced and well-armed vessel would have gone down easily against three next-generation mobile suits, but the Archangel also had the Strike to count on, as well as the ace pilot Mu La Flaga in his Sky Grasper.

"Yzak, let's get in close and finish this in one blow!" Dearka urged his friend and commander even as he fired his guns at the Sky Grasper, which dodged his shots before circling for a counter-attack.

"Don't get reckless!" Yzak snapped back, firing his beam rifle against the Strike and dodging the return fire. "Our enemies aren't stupid or lightly-armed!" Cursing, he looked over to the tactical display which showed an Orb fleet sailing in force nearby, their guns and missiles at the ready.

"We're getting too close to the Orb border…" he whispered unhappily, before an alarm caught his attention. Returning to the battle at hand, he barely had time to register the Strike charging at him, taking advantage of his momentary lapse in concentration. The old Yzak would have launched a counter-attack, believing that the best defence was the best offence…but Yzak had changed. He was more cautious now, though the complete reasons for the change still eluded him.

Before launching this assault on the legged ship, he had realized that the only way the Strike could ever have performed so well was because the pilot was a Coordinator himself. At first, he had been furious at the thought that one of their own had betrayed them, but then reason asserted itself. While a traitor Coordinator as the Strike's pilot was indeed plausible, just as plausible – if not more likely given the nature of the Atlantic Federation – was the idea that a brainwashed 'Combat Coordinator' or a First Generation Coordinator whose Natural parents were in Alliance custody was piloting the unit. In both cases, fury had given way to pity, especially for the latter.

Rather than meeting the attack head on, Yzak let the Strike come to him, blocking its beam sabre with the Duel's shield while simultaneously drawing a beam sabre of his own and counter-attacking. The Strike blocked it easily enough…but it only served as a distraction allowing Yzak to fire his shoulder-mounted missile pod at point-blank range. The Phase-Shift Armour ensured that the unit didn't take any damage…but it didn't mean the kinetic force of the explosions was nullified, and the Strike was sent flying.

"He's yours Nicol!" he shouted, and in response the Blitz turned and fired off several beams towards the Strike. Much to Nicol and Yzak surprise, the Strike managed to avoid all of Nicol's shots, before firing at and destroying the Blitz' Guul, causing the mobile suit to fall into the sea.

"Nicol…!" Yzak shouted in alarm, firing his beam rifle at the Strike in a random pattern to cover Nicol's retreat. "Even for a Coordinator, he's good…" Yzak muttered unhappily, as the Strike evaded all his shots with apparent ease.

"Attention Earth Alliance and ZAFT forces…" a man's voice said firmly over all channels, bringing the battle to a standstill. Yzak looked over to the tactical display and his eyes widened at the sight of the Orb fleet now aiming their weapons at them. "…you are now approaching Orb Union territorial waters. Correct your course immediately or you will be fired upon."

"Are these guys for real?" Dearka asked in disbelief.

"This isn't good…" Yzak muttered, and then noticed with alarm the legged ship changing course towards Orb Union territorial waters. "Are they crazy? They're sailing right into hostile territory!"

"Like hell…!" Dearka shouted, heading straight for the legged ship at full speed and ignoring Yzak's shouted attempts at holding him back. Weaving his way around the suppressive fire from the legged ship, he combined both of his guns and fired at the same time the Sky Grasper fired at his Guul, destroying and sending him falling to the sea.

But the damage had already been done, the legged ship's engines going off in a massive explosion, causing the lumbering vessel to crash into the sea well within firing range of the Orb fleet. After a moment of surprised silence, the fleet commander issued another statement on all channels. "In response to your unauthorized entry into our territory, our forces will now exercise our nation's right to self-defence." Immediately after making that statement, the Orb fleet opened fire, and attack helicopters moved to intercept the Duel. Not wanting to cause an incident, Yzak prudently chose to retreat and the Orb units did not attempt a pursuit.

* * *

Once the withdrawal of the ZAFT forces had been confirmed, the Orb ruling council made a collective sigh of relief. Sitting back in his chair, Uzumi Nara Athha stroked his chin and looked down at the reports strewn on the table, and pondered what course of action to take next. He also wondered about his wayward daughter and her association with the crew of the Alliance warship…technically, they could have them escorted out of the Orb Union once his daughter had been retrieved, but that would be quite uncharitable. But then again, Morgenroete would probably want to have a look at the ship and its mobile suit's data, regardless of the recent progress made in mobile suit development in covert cooperation with the Principality of Zeon.

Standing up, he made a decision and said to the council "Now then, what should we say to cover up this mess?"

* * *

"You wanted to see me, Engineer Simmons?" Quattro said as he entered the woman's office.

"Yes I did, Lieutenant Quattro…and why are you wearing your sunglasses indoors?" she asked, puzzled by the blonde man's behaviour even if it wasn't the first time she had seen him do so.

"My apologies…" Quattro replied, removing his sunglasses as he sat down before her desk. "…it's something of a habit."

"I see; no harm done, I was just curious, and I suppose you have your reasons." She said with a reassuring smile, though Quattro didn't smile back. Coughing to regain her composure, she continued. "How goes the training? Those three girls are our most promising trainee pilots after all."

Quattro sat back and closed his eyes. After a long moment he reopened them before replying "They have talent, that much is certain, as well as excellent teamwork. What is lacking is their lack of experience, which is to be expected I suppose, but what I'm most concerned about is their over-dependence on their units' abilities. A mobile suit is a weapon, but a weapon should serve as an extension of one's body. It'll be a while before I can say I'm confident about their abilities on the battlefield."

"Well for all our sakes I hope this war ends before those girls get sent out onto the battlefield." Erica noted seriously, and Quattro nodded. Mineva herself had said as much before he had left Side 3, although in her case she had hoped that somehow the war would end before Patrick Zala could become the PLANT Supreme Council Chairman. But even then, somehow he knew, and she probably knew as well, that wouldn't be the case.

"Engineer Simmons…" he said, looking at the woman. "…somehow I doubt you called me in here just to ask about the training of those three."

"Indeed…" she replied with a nod; pressing a button on her desk, she activated a display showing the Archangel sailing into a shielded underground dock. Quattro narrowed his eyes, all of his self-control suppressing a reaction from seeing a ship so like the White Base from the One Year War. "…unlikely as it may seem, it would seem that the Archangel and the Strike G-Weapon managed to make it this far. In exchange for supplies, repair, and maintenance, we're being given access to their combat data and assistance. Combined with the AMBAC System, this should speed up development of the Astray significantly. However, regarding your presence…"

"It should be no problem." Quattro reassured her. "Official Zeon policy is to maintain cold but friendly relations with the nations of Earth, regardless of whether or not they're part of the Alliance. The Alliance cannot condemn our covert support for Orb's mobile suit program, considering they have your covert support for theirs, and the Allster Arrangement regarding trade with the Alliance Lunar Base."

"I see…but about that policy and Blue Cosmos…" she began to ask with a worried tone, but Quattro cut her off.

"Rest assured, Blue Cosmos does not and will never receive the support of the Principality." He told her reassuringly. "Thanks to the 'racial melting-pot' policy of the Earth Federation's Space Colonization Plan, Side 3 has no racial discrimination whatsoever, and that policy will be extended to Coordinators. I expect things will get more complicated in the future, but I assure you that the Principality will never accept the ravings of Blue Cosmos fanatics."

"All right then…"

* * *

Mineva walked down the sterile white hallway in the military hospital accompanied by the Prime Minister and several other members of the Cabinet. She didn't like what had been done, but it had to be done, and what she and those who came with her would soon learn would decide what they would do regarding their long-term policy about Coordinators. While she had no intention of accepting Blue Cosmos' ideologies, the abilities of the Coordinators, their critical weakness, and the implications of all those would decide whether or not they would have a place in the future moulded by the ideals of Zeon Zum Deikun.

Waiting for them in the examination room was a female doctor standing before a blank but active display. "Gentlemen, your Highness, we have finished our analysis of the genetic samples obtained from one Athrun Zala. I am Doctor Samantha Crane, and I will explain our findings as quickly yet clearly as possible."

"You may begin, Doctor Crane..." Mineva prompted her, and the doctor nodded.

"Please observe…" she said, pressing a button and showing three genetic diagrams on the display. "…the one on the left is the general genetic diagram of an Oldtype, while the one in the centre is the general genetic diagram of a Newtype. Now observe what happens when we overlap them."

She pressed another button and the two diagrams overlapped. "As you can see the differences between an Oldtype and a Newtype are completely superficial, at least in genetic terms. In other words, both would still count as a Natural. However, in the case of a Coordinator…"

Pressing another button and once again overlapping the general genetic diagrams, even people like Mineva who barely had a general understanding of genetics could see that something was wrong. "…there are key gaps in a Coordinator's genetic code." The doctor explained. "It's not that serious with regards to the First Generation and the Second Generation, but based on our experiments and the general data we have obtained from PLANT, the reason the Third Generation is sterile is because of progressive genetic damage. Not enough to kill them or to cause mutation, but enough to render them sterile."

"And I assume you've found a solution?" Mineva pressed.

The doctor nodded and said "We have, though it is unlikely PLANT would ever accept it. We conducted experiments using genetic material obtained from Athrun Zala as well as other material obtained by Intelligence from PLANT's gene-banks. The genetic stability can be solved by artificially filling in the gaps, but this only exacerbates the damage in the long-term, resulting in horrific mutations. PLANT scientists know that much, but they continue to proceed with their research in the hope of perfecting the process."

"However…"

"Yes; our solution, based on our experiments between Athrun Zala's genetic material and genetic material from our own gene-banks, is to have Coordinators intermarry with Naturals. We have yet to determine the extent of the Coordinator's abilities that will be inherited by the offspring, but the key point is that the genetic damage is repaired and succeeding generations regain their evolutionary potential."

"Our course is set then…" Mineva said, looking at the diagrams sternly. "…the Coordinators must sacrifice their pride if they are to have a future. As for us, it seems our next turn is going to make a lot of people in PLANT very unhappy."

* * *

The Strike arrived at Morgenroete early in the morning, piloted by its pilot, Kira Yamato. Lieutenant Natarle Badgiruel had made a fuss against the idea of giving away combat data to an unallied nation, but they had no real choice in the matter; without resupply and repair, the Archangel had no chance of making it to Alaska, Strike or no Strike.

Morgenroete had taken custody of the unit upon arrival, after which Kira was escorted to meet with Senior Engineer Erica Simmons, who had promptly showed off of Orb's mass produced MBF-M1U M1 Astray, shortly before Cagalli had joined them.

"You know this as well, don't you?" she had replied when he had asked what Orb intended to do with the mobile suits. "Orb will not attack another nation, will not allow another nation to attack them, and will not intervene in the conflicts of other nations. That is Orb's ideal, and the Astray will give us the strength to back up that ideal."

She looked like she wanted to say more, but after a moment, simply walked away. Erica looked after her with a measuring look, and then motioned for Kira to join them as they headed to an observation deck.

"You're quite optimistic about them, Engineer Simmons." Cagalli observed, her arms crossed as she watched three Astrays enter the exercise grounds. "Without a Natural-configured OS, the Astray is unusable."

"I wouldn't say that." Erica responded coolly, Cagalli's eyes widening as she noted the fluid motions of the Astray units.

"Hey look, its Lady Cagalli."

"She's back? I bet she's wondering how we managed to get so good while she was gone."

"Don't be snide Mayura. It's not like she'd have known about the new technology that was implemented in the last refit."

"What new technology?" Cagalli wondered out loud when a crested, red and maroon mobile suit appeared at the other side of the exercise grounds.

"Alright you three, enough chitchat. Let's see what you've got today." The pilot of the red mobile suit said even as he drew a tomahawk with a red-hot blade.

"Is that…a ZAFT mobile suit?" Kira said in shock, noting the mono-eye on the red mobile suit.

"No, and I'd appreciate it if you don't mention it to him. Lieutenant Quattro and his country aren't really friendly with PLANT, though they don't have anything against Coordinators in particular." Erica said, causing the shocked Kira and Cagalli to look at her. "Cagalli, didn't you notice the Astray's new model number? The 'U' stands for universal, as in a unit that can be piloted by any Human, without the need for an advanced support OS."

"Is this…" Cagalli whispered, looking back at the sparring match where the three Astrays fought the venerable Zeon mobile suit. "…the power of the Universal Century?"

* * *

A/N

The 'melting pot' thing was a reasonable assumption on my part, seeing as I thought the Earth Federation probably intended for space colonies to have mixed ethnic groups as part of an effort to contain…certain issues. It's probably why space colonies across the UC appear to have a rather homogenous culture.


	10. Chapter 10

Disclaimer: I do not own any characters, names, and any copyrighted material used in this work. This is a fanfic, period. Everything belongs to their respective owners. Comments and constructive criticism are all very much appreciated.

Chapter 9: The Land of Peace Part 2

"We've been waiting here for a month already!" Dearka finally exploded, slamming his glass down on the table and causing Nicol – who was eating across the table from him – to look at him sharply. "What the hell is with Yzak? He hasn't been acting like himself for a long time now, especially with this plan of his to sit and wait for the legged ship to come out. It's almost like he's trying to be Athrun's replacement or something."

Flashback Begins

_"According to Orb's official statement, the legged ship was able to avoid destruction and escaped northwards to Alaska." The submarine's captain told the three pilots gathered in the CIC. Dearka snorted in disbelief, while both Nicol and Yzak were silently contemplative._

_"That's bullshit." Dearka said. "I say we go in and prove them wrong."_

_"Don't be stupid." The captain told him sternly. "This isn't like that raid on Heliopolis you people did in the past; attacking a national homeland is very different from attacking a colony. There's a reason why despite their small size that country has the strength to resist Alliance and ZAFT pressure for them to enter the war."_

_"He's right Dearka." Nicol said, trying to placate the Buster's pilot. "The Orb homeland isn't something we can confront on our own."_

_"Then what are we supposed to do? Return to Carpentaria in disgrace…Yzak!"_

_"Calm down, Dearka." Yzak finally spoke up. "There's no doubt at all that the legged ship is in Orb. Orb and Morgenroete probably want the Strike and the legged ship's combat data in exchange for resupply and maintenance. I can't really blame them though…and we can't prove it either."_

_"So what…"_

_"We do nothing. We wait to the north of the Orb Union and wait for them to come out."_

Flashback End

"You know, for someone who's supposed to be Yzak's best friend, you don't understand him at all." Nicol said, taking a long drink.

"What?"

"Don't you get it yet? Yzak isn't trying to replace anyone. He's just trying to be more mature and collected to honour Athrun and Rusty's memory. Or did you forget that it was Yzak who signed off on Athrun and Rusty breaking away from the rest of us during the raid on Heliopolis? He probably blames himself for Rusty and Athrun's demise."

"No way…but why would he…does he really think that they, or we blame him for their demise?" Dearka said in reply, his eyes wide with shock.

"No…he blames himself." Nicol said sadly, setting down his glass. "All his numerous brushes with death and his recent promotion just drove it home. That's why he's been so self-conscious and collected lately; he's trying to keep us from recklessly losing our lives."

"Yzak…"

"Just leave him be for now. I'm sure he'll come around on his own after a while."

* * *

Quattro walked down the MS hangar looking for a certain blonde-haired Alliance ace, all the while pondering the Archangel's combat experience during their journey from Heliopolis to Orb. From the destruction of Heliopolis and Artemis, to their encounter with Lacus Clyne, the battle between the 8th Fleet and ZAFT, he was increasingly concerned about the way this war was going.

Then there was their encounter with ZAFT Commander Andrew Waltfeld – who according to the personality profile provided by Orb Intelligence was disturbingly similar to Ramba Ral – and their eventful trip across the ocean to Alaska; if he hadn't known better, it was like the universe (or rather the multi-verse) was playing a joke on the Zeon exiles in the form of a One Year War remake. If so, he wasn't amused; at this rate, it would be logical to assume that the upcoming ZAFT offensive would be similar to his own ill-fated assault on Jaburo, which would be followed by assaults on ZAFT's fortresses in space, just like how the old Earth Federation assaulted Solomon and A Baoa Qu.

Even more worrying for Quattro was what would happen afterwards; in the Universal Century, the reinstated Republic of Zeon had become a Federation puppet after the war – discontent over the affair along with the revelation of Laplace's Box would result in Mineva's ascension to the throne and the restoration of the Principality – along with the rise of the fascist Titans. While Zeon was indeed friendly with Earth, he doubted that would continue if the Alliance went down the same path as the old Earth Federation.

Quattro knew Mineva had plans to guide the Cosmic Era towards the path envisioned by Zeon Zum Deikun; as an idealist tempered by the ruthless nature of the Zabi Dynasty, there was a good chance that she would succeed where he and the other members of her family had failed. Even so, the idea of facing the Titans – or some sort of facsimile – was not an entertaining one, even more so the idea of facing facsimiles of Paptimus Scirocco or Haman Karn.

"I heard that you didn't go and see your parents like the rest of your friends from Heliopolis. Why?" he heard his quarry, Lieutenant Commander Mu La Flaga from beside the Strike's cockpit, and adjusted his path accordingly.

"Well, it's not like I have anything important to talk to them about, and we still have a lot of work to do, so…" the Strike's pilot Kira Yamato began to reply when Mu interrupted.

"Kira…that's not the answer and you know it."

Kira paused in his programming work before he replied "I'm afraid that if I meet them now, then I'll end up asking…asking why the hell they made me a Coordinator."

"Kira…" Mu began to say when turned around to look at Quattro standing and listening nearby. "Eavesdropping is a bad habit, don't you know?"

"I only overheard in passing." Quattro said, removing his sunglasses and walking up the platform to stand beside the cockpit as well. "So Kira, basically you find yourself wondering about your nature as a Coordinator, or rather, you're struggling with yourself as to whether or not you're a race traitor, is that right?"

"And if I am?" Kira replied with a challenging tone, disliking the man's rather cold blue eyes.

"You do realize that you are more than just the sum of your parts, right?" Quattro continued. "Whether or not you're a Coordinator, no matter what your own kind thinks of you, you are who you choose to be. Tell me, why did you choose to fight?"

"I…I only wanted to protect my friends, but…"

"Then there you have it. It's a noble, if rather selfish reason, but one you chose on your own, and what you are supposed to be has nothing to do about it. Which leads to my next question: do you believe you are a race traitor?"

"No…of course not…but…!"

"But nothing…" Quattro said firmly. "A person isn't supposed to be what others want them to be, but what they want to be. How else can we awaken ourselves to one another if we cannot even know ourselves? Let me say this to you: what you are supposed to be, what other people want you to be, are all nothing compared to what you choose to make yourself to be."

"Lieutenant Quattro…"

"Now then, Commander La Flaga…" Quattro said, turning to the rather surprised Alliance ace. "…Engineer Simmons told me to look for you. She said she wanted to see if you're interested in trying out one of the AMBAC-refitted Astrays. Something about wanting to see how well a mobile armour pilot could adapt to piloting a mobile suit."

"Alright then…" Mu said, regarding Quattro with narrowed eyes. "…but first let me ask you: are you a Newtype?"

"And if I am?"

"Nothing, I was just curious that's all. And wondering if I could sense other Newtypes apart from Le Creuset like that girl could sense me. Well then…" Nodding to Kira, he began to head for the MS exercise grounds where Erica was probably waiting for him. After a moment, Quattro put his sunglasses back on, nodded to Kira, and followed after Mu. He too was curious to see how well this man would pilot a mobile suit for the first time.

* * *

Meanwhile, while Kira, Mu, and Quattro were having their enlightening conversation, Murrue and Natarle were in the Archangel's CIC along with Lieutenant Colonel Ledonir Kisaka and discussing the information being displayed about the Porta Panama Spaceport.

"It seems that ZAFT is just about ready to begin their capture operation against the Porta Panama Spaceport." Murrue noted, and Natarle nodded.

"It certainly seems that way." She said, but frowned immediately afterwards. "But something about this doesn't add up. It could just be the rather unprecedented size of the force ZAFT is assembling…or the fact that they're being rather obvious about it."

"So you noticed as well?" Kisaka said wryly. "Lieutenant Quattro said something similar when he saw the information about the impending ZAFT assault."

"Lieutenant Quattro…isn't he that Zeon pilot assisting in Orb's mobile suit program?"

"Yes; both Orb and the Principality are in a rather tight spot here. We want to know more about what might happen next, but since we're officially neutral, we can't ask too many questions either. Fortunately, since the Principality is rather friendly with the Alliance, they've managed to acquire more information than we have on our own, and have graciously sent us some of the data."

"More importantly, if this is true, then we might just be able to take advantage of ZAFT's preoccupation to slip through to Alaska." Murrue said hopefully. "Once we cross the Tropic of Cancer, we'll be in Alaskan airspace. It's unlikely they'll try and continue the pursuit once we get that far."

"I agree." Natarle concurred with a nod. "Let's see, from Orb's closest point to Alaska, moving at optimal speed, I'd say we should be able to cross the Tropic of Cancer in a day and two nights or so."

"However, that's plenty of time for that ZAFT team that was hounding you to launch at least one attack." Kisaka said. "Considering how persistent they are, or at least that's what I've gathered, it's unlikely that they've returned to Carpentaria and are probably just waiting for you to come out."

Murrue simply sighed before saying "Unfortunately, it's not like we have much choice in the matter either."

* * *

Yzak stood on the submarine's upper deck, tossing out strips of bread out onto the water for the gulls to feed on, not having much appetite of his own either. Hearing footsteps behind him, he turned to see Nicol standing behind him with a worried look on his face. "What's wrong Nicol?" he asked. "Did something happen?"

"No, it's just that…" Nicol looked uncomfortable before sighing and continuing. "…Dearka and I are getting worried about you. You haven't been acting yourself lately and…"

"Just spit it out, Nicol." Yzak said, getting irritated. "Whatever it is, we know each other well enough that I won't get offended by what you'll probably say."

"Alright, I just want you to know that neither I nor Dearka blame you for what happened to Rusty and Athrun. And you shouldn't blame yourself either."

"Huh? What are you saying?"

"Well, you were the one who allowed them to go off on their own at Heliopolis and…"

"Enough Nicol…" Yzak said with a sigh, reeling in his irritation. "…don't worry. I don't blame myself. I'm smart enough to know it wasn't my fault, or that they would blame me for what happened. We knew what we were all getting into when we joined the military, so I'm sure that they understood that they might be heading to their deaths when they broke away from the rest of us."

"Then why…" Nicol began to ask when Yzak interrupted.

"Nicol, why did you join ZAFT?"

"After what happened at Junius Seven, I realized that I had to do everything I could to stop the fighting, and to prevent that tragedy from being repeated." Nicol replied after a confused moment.

"Have you had any regrets?"

"No, I have none."

"I see." Yzak said, turning back to the sea with a wistful expression.

"Yzak, what's this all about?"

"Nothing, I just find myself asking if our leaders know when and where to draw the line when the time comes. And if they don't, what am I supposed to do?"

"Our leaders…Yzak, you can't possible mean Patrick Zala?" Nicol said in shock, well aware that Yzak and his mother's opinions coincided with those of Patrick Zala, and wondering at the way his friend was changing. Yzak however, was silent about it all.

* * *

A/N

Hmm…I wonder if my characterization of Quattro Bajeena is correct.


	11. Chapter 11

Disclaimer: I do not own any characters, names, and any copyrighted material used in this work. This is a fanfic, period. Everything belongs to their respective owners. Comments and constructive criticism are all very much appreciated.

Chapter 10: Clashing Blades

"Hey, what's wrong with Commander La Flaga?" Tolle quietly asked Kuzzey as they sat eating in the Archangel's mess hall shortly before they left for Alaska. The usually flamboyant ace pilot seemed rather depressed lately. "He doesn't seem alright. Did the captain shoot him down or something? It's rather obvious that he has it for her."

More than a little embarrassed, Kuzzey promptly shushed his friend before replying "Keep it down would you! Anyway, do you remember a while back the Commander trying to pilot one of those Orb mobile suits?"

After Tolle nodded, Kuzzey continued. "Apparently, he did quite well, pressing that Zeon pilot hard. True, the Zeon mobile suit in question was an outdated model, but both the pilot and that engineer lady were quite impressed."

"So what's the problem?"

"Commander La Flaga wanted to keep the unit, and Morgenroete didn't let him."

…that's it?" Tolle finally said, raising his eyebrows in disbelief. "He's sulking like a kid because he didn't get a mobile suit?" Kuzzey merely shrugged in response.

* * *

"What's the situation?" Yzak asked the moment he stepped into the submarine's CIC. The captain, Dearka, and Nicol were all there, standing around the map table.

"Orb just launched its fleet." The captain replied with a nod. "Supposedly it's for military exercises, but they usually announce it sometime beforehand, so most likely they're escorting our quarry out of their territory."

"That sounds likely." Yzak conceded, after which Dearka spat.

"Dirty bastards; once we get rid of that legged ship, we'll have all the proof we'll need to squeeze the juice out of Orb."

"Get over it, Dearka." Yzak told his best friend, who gave him a shocked look. "Is it really so hard to understand why Orb wants to gain access to mobile suit technology?"

"Well no, but…"

"Put yourself in the Earth Alliance and Orb's shoes, Dearka. After seeing the power of the mobile suit with no immediate counter at hand, wouldn't you want to gain that power yourself before the war ends in defeat?" Yzak pressed, causing Dearka to adopt a troubled expression.

"So basically, you're saying that there's nothing wrong with Orb and the Alliance getting mobile suits?" Nicol asked, also troubled by Yzak's logic, but the silver-haired pilot snorted in response.

"Of course not; from a strategic standpoint, the Alliance in particular getting mobile suits is a disaster. All the same though, it's not something that can be condemned so easily. After all, one reason we developed mobile suits in the first place was to offset the Alliance's superior numbers. And I certainly wouldn't mind facing worthy opponents on even terms."

"While all this is quite enlightening…" the captain interceded with a cough. "…what we need to decide right now is how to deal with the legged ship."

"Easy…" Dearka said, crossing his arms. "…ambush them the moment they leave Orb Union waters."

"No; we'll wait for them here before we launch the attack." Yzak countermanded, before indicating a group of small islands, atolls, and islets a good distance from Orb's waters. "It's perfect for an ambush, as we'll be able to use the terrain for deception tactics and guerrilla warfare. The distance in particular should deter Orb from butting in as well. The two of you prepare to launch immediately."

"Roger!" Dearka and Nicol responded with matching salutes, though the former had a rather vicious grin on his face.

* * *

"Tolle, are you really sure about this?" Kira asked, very worried for his friend, who at that moment was wearing a pilot suit and was already sitting in a Sky Grasper's cockpit. Mu stood nearby, along with Master Sergeant Murdock, both with worried expressions on their faces.

"Don't worry, I passed the simulator training with flying colours, and besides, I'll only be providing support for the Strike. What could possibly go wrong?" Tolle replied, cheerfully reassuring his friend.

"Tolle…" Kira began to say but broke off when Mu placed a hand on his shoulder, shook his head and looked at Tolle.

"If this is your decision, we won't interfere." He told the young man. "As you say, you did complete the simulator training, but still…don't get reckless."

"Roger!" Tolle cheerfully replied, but with a tone of seriousness in his voice, simultaneously giving a salute. Mu and Kira nodded, the latter still worried, and then they headed for their respective units.

* * *

"Still no sign of ZAFT?" Murrue asked, still surprised by the lack of an ambush the moment they had left Orb Union waters.

"None." The reply came, and Murrue shared a worried look with her XO, neither believing that their enemies would just return to Carpentaria when there was a large enough attack window to take advantage of during the relatively short trip from Orb to Alaska.

"Unfortunately, it seems that whatever it is they're planning, we have no choice but to wait for them to make the first move." Natarle said, clearly frustrated and unhappy at the idea of letting the enemy take the initiative. "At the very least, the shallower waters near those islands we'll be passing by shortly should…"

"What's wrong?" Murrue said, disconcerted by the sight of seeing the usually collected XO now looking at the tactical display with a growing look of alarm on her face.

"Oh shit!" the woman said uncharacteristically, surprising the captain. "It's a trap!"

Almost simultaneously, alarms began to sound from the CIC as the ship's sensors picked up three approaching units. "Three mobile suits closing from multiple directions…they're all G-Weapons!"

"All hands to stations and issue a Level One Battle Alert!" Murrue ordered, trying to keep the situation under control while the XO pulled herself together.

"Place the Gottfried, Valiant One and Two, all Hell Darts, and the Igelstellung on standby!" Natarle barked out, her iron control now back. "Load all missile tubes with Wombats and standby to engage!"

* * *

The three ZAFT Gundams soared towards the Archangel on their Guuls, Yzak and Nicol calm and collected, Dearka all but twitching in anticipation. "I'm detecting three units launching from the legged ship." Nicol called out. "Two fighters…and one mobile suit; it's the Strike!"

"Dearka, we'll leave the ship and those fighters to you." Yzak ordered. "Nicol and I will handle the Strike."

Without even saying an acknowledgement, Dearka took off. He was furious, filled with pent-up frustration caused by repeated failures trying to take down the legged ship, and most importantly, angry at the realization that this ship and everything and everyone associated with it was the indirect cause of Yzak's changes. He wanted his old friend back, and while destroying it would probably not bring back the old Yzak (or for that matter, Rusty and Athrun), it would certainly be satisfying. Victory always had a sweet taste.

* * *

Yzak cursed at the sight of Dearka diving in recklessly as the legged ship loosed a storm of beams, bullets, and missiles against the Buster. One of the fighters in particular seemed to be armed with some kind of heavy beam cannon, if the dark red beam lancing through the air in the distance was any indication. Still, he had another matter to attend to: the Strike was now closing on them, firing its beam rifle in an expert firing pattern.

The Duel and the Blitz split up, cornering the Strike between them, using their superior numbers to counter its superior agility. Yzak smiled; the pilot was good, there was no doubt about that. A worthy opponent indeed, as should have been expected from a fellow Coordinator.

* * *

The Buster dodged the legged ship's fire with ease, easily intercepting any incoming missiles. But while they couldn't hurt him, he couldn't hurt them either. At least the ship couldn't. The two fighters swooping around were an entirely different story, however. One of them in particular was quite annoying, with its heavy beam cannon. Dodging its fire and a shot from one of the legged ship's heavy rail-guns, he cursed angrily when a missile from the other fighter exploded against one of his unit's legs. The Phase-Shift Armour may have rendered the explosion moot, but Dearka was no fool. He knew they were aiming for his sub-flight launcher and to force him to retreat.

"You're annoying…try this for size insect!" he shouted defiantly as the Alliance fighter flew by him, simultaneously firing his shoulder-mounted missile pods.

Tolle grimaced as the missiles swarmed after him; after a moment of panic, he remembered a trick he had learned in the simulator. Smiling at the idea, he flew low over the sea, his exhaust throwing up a makeshift shield of water that detonated the missiles behind him without damaging his unit. As he soared back into the sky, he laughed at his success. Miriallia would always remember him that way. A single missile that hadn't been destroyed by the water slammed into the Sky Grasper's fuselage and exploded, turning the aircraft and its pilot into a ball of fire.

"Tolle…!" Miriallia shouted in the CIC as Tolle's signal was lost, her voice filled with utter loss and grief.

"Kid…!" Mu shouted, mirroring the girl in the Archangel's CIC; it wasn't the first time he had lost a colleague, but he would never get used to it. Even more so when that colleague was still young and could have had a bright future ahead of him when the war came to an end.

"One down, two more to go…" Dearka smirked triumphantly, firing his guns expertly and destroying two of the legged ship's point-defence guns.

"You murderous bastard..!" Mu roared, circling around to attack.

* * *

The Duel, the Blitz, and the Strike duelled in the air, green beams crisscrossing the air or dissipating harmlessly against shields. "This is getting annoying." Yzak snarled, getting irritated at the indecisive nature of their battle as they traded fire with one another. Then he realized he should never tempt fate by saying things like that.

"What the hell?" he found himself saying in surprise as the Strike charged at him out of the blue with a beam sabre at the ready. Reflexively, he drew his own beam sabre and parried the stroke, but was sent flying when the Strike literally slammed its shield against him before destroying his Guul with a downward stab of his beam sabre. Using his engines to slow down his descent and to stabilize his unit, Yzak fired a grenade at the Strike the moment he landed, but the Strike shot it down with its Vulcan cannons and charged towards Yzak again.

"It's the same as that time." He muttered anxiously, his scar prickling as he remembered how he got it in the first place. "What is this guy? One moment he's just like any of us, and then he becomes a monster. Could he be a berserker?" he broke off his musings with a curse as the Strike charged down at him from the sky.

"Yzak…!" Nicol shouted, firing off beams as he closed in, forcing the Strike and its pilot to break off and dodge…before it fired a pinpoint beam that destroyed Nicol's Guul, causing him to plummet to the ground as well. As expected, the Strike and its berserker pilot immediately moved to attack, causing Yzak to curse angrily. Nicol was a brilliant pilot, of that there was no doubt about that given his red uniform, but he had never been as skilled as the rest of them, and he even admitted as such.

Before the Strike could engage the Blitz, Yzak had charged in from the side and knocked the Blitz out of the way…but lost his unit's right arm in the process. Not satisfied with this, the Strike kicked the Duel and sent it flying into a cliff a good distance away.

"Damnation…"Yzak spat, before an alarm caught his attention. Looking its way, he was horrified to see his unit's power level was now dangerously low…which meant that his Phase-Shift Armour was now offline. "…oh shit!"

Once again, the Strike moved to deliver the killing blow while the Duel was down, discarding its shield and holding a beam sabre two-handed. Landing before the slumped mobile suit, it raised the weapon to stab downwards, only for Nicol to ram the Strike and force it aside. Almost immediately, he fired his rocket-assisted anchor and forced the Strike even further back a good distance.

"Yzak; hurry and get out of here! I'll cover you!" Nicol shouted, activating his beam sabre.

"What are you…?"

"Hurry; you're no good dead, and that's what going to happen if you stay here!"

Cursing, Yzak piloted his unit upright and moved to retreat. "Nicol…don't waste your life."

"Roger!" Nicol replied as he stood his ground while the Strike was moving to engage. Nicol swung his weapon in a broad arc once the enemy mobile suit was in striking range, but it simply used its backpack-mounted engines to quickly hover back out of range before moving in fast and cutting off the Blitz's legs at the knees.

"Oh shit!" Nicol cursed as his unit tumbled to the ground, but his attention was drawn to the fact that the Strike was now stabbing down at him. Desperately he moved his unit to avoid getting killed by the blow, and was somewhat successful; the Strike missed his unit's chest, destroying only the Blitz's head component.

As the unit tumbled back, it phase-shifted down as the energy supply ran low. Simultaneously, the Strike stepped back as both its armour and its weapon went offline as its own energy ran low as well. Realizing that the Strike could still kill him with its Vulcan cannons, Nicol made a decision. He opened the cockpit hatch, removed his helmet, and stepped out with his hands held up: he surrendered.

* * *

The Buster in the meantime continued to simultaneously engage both the Archangel and the last Alliance fighter, when a message arrived from Yzak.

"Retreat…? Like hell! This ends today!" he said angrily, disregarding the order before aiming one of his guns at the Archangel.

"Go to hell!" Mu spat as he fired his heavy beam cannon at the Buster even as it fired a beam at the Archangel. The beam hit one of the Archangel's Hell Dart batteries, rocking the ship with a massive explosion and causing serious damage.

"All right…!" Dearka cheered, not even registering the fact that his unit had been hit at the same time by the Sky Grasper's heavy beam cannon. The Buster exploded immediately afterwards, immolating Dearka Elsman.

* * *

A/N

Yes, I spared Nicol. Are you happy? I still had to kill Tolle and Dearka though. And yes, Kira went into SEED mode when Tolle was killed.


	12. Chapter 12

Disclaimer: I do not own any characters, names, and any copyrighted material used in this work. This is a fanfic, period. Everything belongs to their respective owners. Comments and constructive criticism are all very much appreciated.

Chapter 11: Ice and Fire Part 1

The mirror on the wall of Yzak's quarters shattered as an enraged Yzak threw the first thing that came to hand against it in full rage. Then he calmed down, or rather, had his anger snuffed out as though by ice water, as he realized what he had thrown: their graduation picture.

Flashback Begins

"_Hurry and send out a search and rescue team!" Yzak ordered as he stood in the submarine's CIC._

"_Belay that order." The captain said from where he stood by the communications console, his voice surprisingly calm._

"_What?" Yzak said in surprise, turning to the captain. "What's the meaning of this captain?"_

"_Precisely what I said." The captain replied. "We've just received priority orders: we are to return to Carpentaria and to join the forces set aside for Operation Spitbreak with all possible speed."_

"_Is that so now? In that case I countermand those orders."_

"_Unfortunately Commander Joule, these orders come directly from Commander Le Creuset, who has been assigned to command the upcoming operation by the Supreme Council itself."_

"_But…!"_

"_Commander Joule; we are fighting a war. As elite pilots, I would have expected that you and your fellow pilots had understood the underlying realities of such a situation better."_

_Yzak bit back a sharp retort, clenching his fists in frustration. "Understood; change course immediately, and proceed to Carpentaria at once." He snarled out before storming from the CIC._

Flashback End

Kneeling down, he carefully picked up the picture from amidst the broken glass and splintered wood that littered the floor. "Rusty, Athrun, Miguel, Nicol, Dearka…have I, have I failed you all?" he whispered, slumping down on the floor beside his bed and sadly looking at the picture of him and his friends standing together at the grounds of the PLANT military academy.

* * *

The cold metal bars of the cell-door closed with a clang as the Alliance guards closed his cell before walking out of the detention block, leaving the prisoner alone. Sighing, Nicol sat down on the bunk and wondered what was going to happen now. He was on his way to Alaska, and would probably be handed over to Alliance Intelligence once the legged ship got there. He would then be interrogated and probably be executed afterwards, though there was the possibility that he would just be imprisoned until the war ended…or worse. Knowing the Atlantic Federation, he would probably be brainwashed into becoming a 'Combat Coordinator' just like the Strike's pilot. Or perhaps he wasn't…curious, Nicol resolved to make a request to the guards when they came to deliver his food.

* * *

The helicopter landed on the barren coast of the barely-habitable island while an Orb cruiser and four destroyers warily cruised nearby. Several soldiers jumped out, along with a certain blonde man wearing sunglasses. The island has suffered surprisingly little damage, though the wreckage littered on the beach and floating nearby indicated that at least one ZAFT Gundam had been destroyed. Quattro knew he shouldn't be surprised, but he was nonetheless. Of course a destroyed mobile suit wouldn't cause as much damage as it should, considering they weren't nuclear-powered. "Did you find anything?" he shouted.

Lieutenant Colonel Ledonir Kisaka shook his head before replying "Nothing; just bits and pieces and no bodies. At the very least, we know that the Archangel was able to survive and escape, though from the state of what's left, unfortunately we won't be able to know which of the G-Weapons was destroyed."

"I see." Quattro replied, taking off his sunglasses before looking around the beach and then to the north, to Alaska. "JOSH-A, Jaburo, so similar and yet so different…" he quietly mused. "…but which battle it will resemble, I wonder? Will it be similar to the way things went back during the One Year War, or will it be like during the Gryps Conflict?"

* * *

It had been two days since he had been captured, and by his knowledge of geography he knew they would be arriving in Alaska later today. The door to the detention block opened, and the guards who usually brought his food and checked in on him came in, along with someone Nicol had never seen before. He was a young man, about the same age as he was, and wearing an enlisted uniform. The Strike's pilot, Kira Yamato, or that was what the guards told him.

"The guards said you wanted to meet me?" Kira asked Nicol warily.

Nicol nodded in response, his facial expression neutral. "I did; they told me it might be alright assuming the captain approved and you agreed."

"Why?"

"I have a few things to ask about you."

"Such as…?" Kira pressed, worried about what his fellow Coordinator wanted to know about him, but took reassurance from what that Zeon pilot had told him in Orb, and what Flay had told him prior to him going to the detention block.

"Well for starters, are you a Coordinator?" Nicol asked, looking at Kira's eyes. He had learned basic interrogation techniques at the academy, and while he certainly wasn't an expert when it came to sifting truth from lies, he was reasonably confident that he would be able to tell if this Kira person was answering truthfully or not.

"I am, and what of it?" Kira answered in a somewhat challenging tone, though Nicol refused to rise to the bait.

"Are you a First Generation Coordinator?" he continued to ask.

"Yes, I am." Kira replied, and Nicol sat back on his bunk.

"I see." He replied with a nod. "Thanks for indulging me, but I think I'm satisfied with that." Noticing Kira's surprised expression, he continued. "I understand you have your reasons for being with the Earth Alliance and fighting against us, but I won't ask about those reasons. And no, I don't condemn you for it, nor do I consider you a traitor to our kind."

Kira was somewhat stumped by this, though he quickly decided not to press, realizing that the ZAFT pilot probably thought his parents were being held in custody by the Alliance, and that was why he was piloting the Strike. Instead, he went with a different question. "Did…do you know Athrun Zala?"

Nicol looked at Kira in surprise. "Yes, I knew him. He was fellow pilot, but how do you…?"

"He was a friend of mine, someone I grew up with on the Moon." Kira replied, and Nicol realized that he had probably faced off with Athrun on Heliopolis during this raid. He immediately felt sad for him, assuming he was telling the truth, being forced to fight his own childhood friend. At the same time, he wondered if he had been the one to end Athrun…no, that was impossible. Miguel had reported that Athrun had left him to fight the Strike, and there was no way the Strike could have taken out the Aegis after that.

"I see…I'm afraid you're not going to like what I'm going to tell you." He said sadly, looking away from Kira. "Athrun…he's MIA. He never made it back to the Vesalius from Heliopolis, probably from a secondary failsafe in his unit. I'm sorry…"

Stricken, Kira stumbled back from the cell and towards the door of the detention block. Before he left, he looked back and said softly "Thank you…thank you for telling me about Athrun…you were a friend of him as well right? If so, then I'm glad to have met you."

Left alone in the detention block, Nicol lied down on his bunk and felt relief that at the very least the Strike's pilot wasn't a brainwashed 'Combat Coordinator'. As far as he knew, the Atlantic Federation always lived up to its bargains, keeping the families of the First Generation in their service alive and in relative comfort so long as their end of the bargain was met. Unfortunately for him, execution or worse were the apparent fates in wait for him.

* * *

The main gates leading into the immense underground fortress that was JOSH-A slowly ground open as the Archangel and six escorting destroyers sailed towards it. At the same time, several people were viewing the scene and reviewing large amounts of collected information in a shadowed room somewhere in the fortress.

"The Archangel…to think that it actually made it this far." One man ventured unhappily.

"I certainly never expected it to come here, but now that it is, what do we do about it?" a second man asked.

"Before that…" a third person, a woman this time, spoke up. "…we should decide about this young man, Kira Yamato, and his fate."

"The G-Weapons are our vanguard!" The first man responded vehemently. "A Coordinator should not be allowed to pilot one of those units!"

"Well, it doesn't really matter by this point." The fourth person interjected lazily. Despite his irreverent tone, everyone in the room automatically differed to his judgment. After all, Muruta Azrael wasn't just the Director of the National Defence Industry Commission but also the leader of Blue Cosmos. "We already have three new G-Weapons that should surpass the first five that were made in Heliopolis, so leaving the Strike as it is should be fine. That pilot has proven useful thus far, so I say we reward him by giving him the chance to go out in a blaze of glory."

Azrael smirked as he reviewed Kira's data. If Coordinators wanted to kill their own kind, then who was he to stop them? At the very least he should tolerate their continued existence for a while longer, unnatural though they may be.

"That's true…" the second man nodded his assent. "…now that we have the Forbidden, the Raider, and the Calamity, the Strike is all but useless. All we need is the combat data from it and the recovered Blitz and we can put the Strike Dagger into mass production and accelerate the development of our other prototypes."

"Speaking of which…" the fifth person, another woman, spoke up. "…what do we do about what's left of the Blitz?"

"We leave it be." Azrael said. "As long as we have its data, we don't actually need that pile of junk."

"That should be fine, I suppose." The first man grudgingly conceded, causing Azrael to briefly glance in his direction. "What of the rest of the crew?"

"Lieutenant Junior Grade Natarle Badgiruel may yet prove useful." the first woman replied. "She doesn't seem to be as…tainted, as the rest of the crew are."

"Flay Allster could have proven useful as well…" Azrael noted in dissatisfaction with a tone of disgust in his voice. "…unfortunately, she seems to have failed to retain her objectivity while manipulating that Coordinator brat, actually developing feelings for him and becoming pregnant with his spawn."

"Then we should leave her to go out in a blaze of glory along with the rest of the crew." The sixth man finally said. "The Cyclops System is already finished and is ready for activation at any time. All we have to do now is to wait."

"I don't like the idea of senselessly sacrificing the 'Hawk of Endymion' so readily." The second woman protested. "Tainted though he may be, his talents may yet have use for us."

"How do you propose we do so?" Azrael asked, amused by the idea. "I don't think we can trust him to pilot one of our units, let alone a G-Weapon, regardless of his abilities."

"I wouldn't trust him either on the battlefield." She replied with a shrug. "I say we put him in a flight school somewhere where we can isolate him from the military hierarchy and at the same time continue to take advantage of his abilities."

"That sounds good to me." Azrael agreed approvingly, before turning to the sixth man. "Oh, and regarding that prisoner, tempting though it may be, I don't think we need another 'Combat Coordinator' by this point. After all, we've already spent so much money on the Extended Humans, so why don't we just leave him as he is already?"

"If you believe that to be best, then so be it." The second man agreed.

"Very good…" Azrael said, standing up. "…I'll leave putting all this into motion to you people, as I have other matters to attend to."

"Just leave it to us…" the sixth man said with a smile. "…rest assured, everything will go according to plan, for the sake of our blue and pure world."

* * *

A/N

Yes, Quattro knows Alaska is the real target of Operation Spitbreak, though he can't exactly tell anyone because he has little proof, and by this point in the story, the existence of Newtypes and their abilities are virtually unknown outside of Side 3.

By the way, someone sent a message to me asking why Zeon has gone back to using MS and warships dating back to the Gryps Conflict (Gaplant, Qubeley, the Gwadan), the First (Endra-class) and Second Neo Zeon Wars (Geara/Jagd Doga, Nightingale), and even the One Year War (Dom and Zanzibar-class); well, the answer is simple – redundancy. Rather than fielding a wide variety of high-performance units that are difficult to maintain and impossible to mass-produce, they instead field simple, rugged, and reliable units, just like the old Earth Federation did during the final stages of the One Year War (a strategy that aided in ensuring victory for the Earth Federation).


	13. Chapter 13

Disclaimer: I do not own any characters, names, and any copyrighted material used in this work. This is a fanfic, period. Everything belongs to their respective owners. Comments and constructive criticism are all very much appreciated.

Chapter 12: Ice and Fire Part 2

The Rewloola-class Battle Cruiser slowly entered the abandoned colony's spaceport, escorted by three Geara Doga mobile suits. The captain looked out over the debris-strewn spaceport as he floated on the bridge; as the ship stopped moving and docked with Mendel, he opened a channel. "Commander Marida…" he said. "…we've completed docking procedures."

"Understood…" Lieutenant Commander Marida Cruz replied from her unit's cockpit. "…it seems that at the very least the spaceport remains usable. What's Mendel like inside?"

"Scans indicate minimal life signs; basically the colony is barren, but barely habitable."

"I see." Marida replied, before bringing her Qubeley online. "I'll go on ahead and scout out the colony." In response, the Rewloola-class' hangar doors slid open and two Jagd Dogas moved into position behind her. "Just make sure to keep up." She told the Newtype Corps pilots before she gently floated out of the hangar; once clear of the ship, she blasted off to the rear of the spaceport where a massive door leading into the colony automatically opened at their approach.

The abandoned colony was a virtual wasteland, any sign of Human habitation since lost to the artificially maintained elements. Even that was starting to slip; their sensors detected that the colony's life support systems and environmental controls were barely functioning as it was. "Intelligence must be slipping when they said this place had some sort of advanced technology to be salvaged." Marida whispered, fiddling with the sensor controls, when they detected something…unusual.

Raising an eyebrow in surprise, she immediately closed her eyes and focused her powers on what her Qubeley had detected…and immediately fell to gasping, one hand rising to grab her left temple in an instinctive response to the pain, while the other subconsciously moved to hold her abdomen. "What the hell was that?"

Cursing, she immediately changed course and headed for whatever it was that she sensed; after several minutes of flying, she spotted a cluster of buildings in the distance and again raised an eyebrow in surprise. Slowly landing amidst the buildings, she noticed that all but one of the structures was in ruins, which meant that the lone standing structure was not only solidly built, but was probably meant to house something important. "_Perhaps Intelligence wasn't wrong after all…_" she thought with a smile. "Captain, sent out additional mobile suits as well as ground troops to secure the area; I may have found something." She radioed back.

"Understood Commander, standby." The captain responded.

"Spread out and look for anything suspicious." She ordered the two Jagd Dogas that had escorted her. She however, remained in front of the main building, unexplainably puzzled by why she was so drawn to this place. Ten minutes later, several shuttles and three Geara Dogas arrived. The latter immediately joined the Jagd Dogas out on patrol, while three squads armed with assault rifles and automatic grenade launchers and wearing normal suits poured out of the former. Pulling out and double-checking an SMG, she deactivated her unit before leaving the cockpit and joining the troops on the ground.

"Sergeant Major…" she ordered. "…send two squads to secure the upper levels. You and your squad are coming with me."

"Understood, commander." The man replied, relaying the orders before turning back to Marida. "Where will we be going commander?"

"The lower levels of the structure are shielded from sensors." She replied, walking towards the yawning doors followed by the soldiers. "Whatever this place is, it was built to last, and whatever is under it was not meant to be found."

Gulping at his misgivings about going into a place that in all likelihood was probably not so different from one of the gassed colonies dating back to the One Year War, the man and his soldiers followed the young Cyber-Newtype as she walked into the building. Two squads peeled off after they entered, while Marida and the third squad cautiously searched for a way down. When they finally found it, Marida was rather surprised by the sign that identified what the underground facilities were. "Hibiki Genetic Labs…?" she wondered out loud. "Blue Cosmos aside, what's so secret about a genetics laboratory?"

Narrowing her eyes in suspicion, she immediately went down to the underground genetic facilities with all possible speed, where she took in the sight of the cloning tanks, as well as the displays showing Human embryos kept from death by the advanced technology around them.

"What in God's name have we stumbled on?" the Sergeant Major gasped in horror at the sight, while all the other solders had looks of horror clearly visible through their helmets. Marida however, merely stowed her weapon before removing her helmet and running a hand through her fiery hair. Taking a deep breath and noting the dry and all but lifeless quality of the air, she smiled, though her eyes retained their usual coldness. "Well now…" she said wryly, looking around her with something akin to nostalgia. "…I don't know about you, but this certainly feels very familiar. Somehow, it almost feels like coming home."

* * *

"I've had enough…" Kira told Flay, tears pooling at the corners of his eyes, lying down on their shared bunk with his head on her lap. "…I don't want to lose anything important to me again. I know that I'm being selfish, but…I have to do what I have to do, even if people call me arrogant and selfish, even if no one understands…"

"I understand you." Flay said, smiling softly down at him and wiping away his tears with her hand. "I know how much you worry, how much you've been hurt, how much you suffer and cry, that's why, I want you to know, you are not alone."

Kira looked up at Flay blankly for a moment before he smiled, remembering how after his battle with the Blitz she had confessed and apologized for trying to manipulate him into becoming a mere tool for her to get vengeance for her father, and how he had apologized for taking her for granted. Now it seemed that things had gone full circle; their relationship was no longer purely physical in nature, and was something…more, something he couldn't completely define.

"Flay…you're right. Even if you're the only one who understands me,I can't lose, not until all this ends, so I want you to know, no matter what happens, I love you, and I always will."

* * *

"The Archangel's resupply and maintenance are proceeding well, I take it?" Mu asked as he walked beside Murrue towards the exit, the bag carrying his personal belongings stowed over a shoulder. Murrue sighed at the obvious nature of the question, not even bothering to answer it and instead continued to brood over the state of things. Yesterday's inquiry regarding their actions en route to Alaska had not gone well, the Alaskan Command Staff spinning all their experiences as an 'unfortunate' consequence of the 'unnatural' influence of Kira Yamato, despite the fact that they would never have gotten here without his efforts (and it certainly didn't stop them from taking the Strike's combat data).

When the late Admiral Halberton had told her about Alaska's mismanagement of the war, she had assumed some sort of bureaucratic pandering, but she had never expected Blue Cosmos to have extended its influence this far, so much so that she began to have second thoughts regarding the Earth Alliance and its cause. There were a few other surprises as well; for one thing, Kira had been commissioned as an ensign, though the reasons for it still eluded her (though Natarle suspected it was to clear up some bureaucratic issues regarding his formal assignment to the Strike G-Weapon), as well as the reassignment of the Archangel to the Alaskan Defence Force despite primarily being a space warship. And there was the matter of the transfers…both Natarle and Mu were being transferred off the ship, the former to head back to the Moon, and the latter to a flight school in California.

"Captain Ramius, Commander La Flaga…" Lieutenant Natarle Badgiruel (along with the transfer, she had given a promotion as well) called out to them from the exit. "…I appreciate everyone coming to see us off, but at this rate we'll miss our transport."

"Oh that's right." Mu said, looking at his watch. "Well then, this is goodbye I suppose." He said, looking at the captain, before he grimaced. "I still don't understand though; why do they want me to teach in California?"

"Well, with you teaching them your techniques, we might be able to reduce the casualties on the battlefield." She replied, smiling indulgently. He merely snorted in response, before sighing and giving her a salute.

"I hope we get to see each other again someday." He told her glumly, and she returned the salute somewhat sadly.

As he and Natarle turned to walk away, Murrue called out to the other woman. "Natarle, before you go, I just want you to know that despite all our clashes, I still appreciate everything you've done for this ship and everyone on it. Good luck, I just know you'll make an excellent captain when the time comes."

Natarle looked at the captain, before she too sighed and saluted somewhat regretfully. While it was true that she clashed with many of the other woman's views, she also respected her inner strength and abilities. "Thank you captain; I too hope we can meet again someday, perhaps somewhere other than the battlefield. Goodbye and good luck."

* * *

"It won't be long now…" Captain William Sutherland said to Azrael as he walked with the rest of the Atlantic Federation Command Staff into their waiting submarine. "…ZAFT will be throwing almost everything they have against us. Neither the Eurasians nor the Strike and that ship will hold for more than a few hours."

"What are the expected losses for the enemy?"

"At least 50%...at most, total…" the man replied with a cold smile, something that the blonde businessman reciprocated.

* * *

"So where's your transport?" Natarle asked Mu as they reached her designated transport, who fumbled around before pulling out a folded piece of paper that later turned out to be his transfer orders. "Let's see, loading bay 49…"

"It's that way." Natarle pointed out, and the man flashed a grateful smile. To her surprise, he offered her a friendly hand.

"I guess this is goodbye, but if so, then good luck lieutenant." He told her as they shook their hands. She nodded, giving a grateful smile before she turned and headed for her transport. Once she was out of sight, Mu immediately headed back the way he came. "_That Zeon pilot told me to trust my sensitivity before we left Orb…_" he thought darkly as he ran down the half-deserted hallways back to the Archangel. "_…then if I'm right, something is bad is going to happen, and I need to be in the Archangel!_"

* * *

Unknown to most of the people still at Alaska, at that moment, a vast fleet of ZAFT submarines was closing in on Alaska under the water, while high in the upper atmosphere atmospheric carriers lumbered towards their target. In space, shrouded by heavy N-Jammer interference, ZAFT mobile suits entered their drop pods as the fleet awaited final orders.

In his command centre in the ZAFT asteroid fortress of Jachin Due, PLANT Supreme Council Chairman Patrick Zalastood up and addressed all the ZAFT personnel in the room and those awaiting their orders elsewhere. "It is my sincere hope that this battle will bring about a quick end to this war, and usher in a new era of freedom and justice. Commence Operation Spitbreak, target: Joint Supreme Headquarters Alaska!"

For the ZAFT forces assigned to the task, there was confusion, at least initially, as they had thought that their target would be the Panama. However, they quickly realized that was in fact, the whole point, to force the Alliance to transfer all their available reinforcements to Panama, and leave their own headquarters undefended. As they closed in on Alaska, all the ZAFT personnel were in high spirits, believing they were headed for the decisive final battle of the war…never realizing that they were actually heading into a trap.

* * *

Mineva, the Zeon Energy Minister, and several senators were in normal suits inspecting the massive Jupitris-class vessels now approaching completion in Side 3's shipyards. "The Energy Fleet will be completed ahead of schedule, thanks to the new supplies now coming in from the Moon." The foreman said, pleased by the way things were going.

Mineva nodded, when her suit's communicator caught her attention. "This is Sovereign Zabi and company; what's happening?"

"Your Highness, ZAFT's launched Operation Spitbreak! However, the target isn't Panama, its Alaska!"

"What?" Mineva said, shocked by this news. "Understood, I'm on my way."

"Your Highness, please be on your way. You have more important matters to attend to, and we can continue the inspection on our own." A senator told her, and with a nod Mineva was headed back to the airlock.

* * *

"The Council didn't approve of this Siegel! Patrick intends to destroy the Earth Alliance leadership in one fell swoop!" Councillor Canaver told Siegel Clyne via vid-phone.

"That's assuming the Alliance didn't see this coming!" Siegel said, breaking out in a cold sweat.

"If you're right, then Patrick will probably use us as scapegoats. He's gambling everything on such a risky operation."

"I know that!" Siegel said, taking several deep breaths in an effort to calm down. "I have no choice; can you handle things here?"

"If I have to…" the woman replied worriedly.

"Good; then I'll leave watching over PLANT to you." He told her, before turning the vid-phone off and looking at Lacus, who was sitting alone in the garden as she was fond of doing recently. He sighed at the thought of his daughter's depression ever since her fiancé had been declared MIA, and was worried how this would affect her.

"Lacus…" he called to her, and she looked at him over a shoulder. "…pack your things, we're leaving."

* * *

A/N

I hate writing about mushy things, but I needed to get Kira and Flay together so I can get him and Lacus out of the way in Destiny. Seriously, the UC characters will be getting the spotlight in Destiny. As a peek, I will say this much: Ple 3 and Marida will have a certain bone to pick with Rey Za Burrel.


	14. Chapter 14

Disclaimer: I do not own any characters, names, and any copyrighted material used in this work. This is a fanfic, period. Everything belongs to their respective owners. Comments and constructive criticism are all very much appreciated.

Chapter 13: Ice and Fire Part 3

In the deserted and shadow-shrouded Joint Operation Room in JOSH-A, a single console flashed out warnings as it displayed the sensor shadows of ZAFT submarines, drop pods, and atmospheric carriers closing in from multiple directions and already well within the outer defence perimeter. Normally, this would have the control personnel up and about setting off alarms and deploying the Alaskan Defence Force, but there was no one to see, no one to care.

As the sensor shadows passed the inner defence perimeter, automatic failsafe systems came online and alarms began to scream across the underground fortress. "It's already started, damn it!" Mu snarled as he ran down the deserted corridors back to the Archangel.

High above the frozen landscape, ZAFT drop pods burst open, and GINNs and CGUEs began to free-fall. Automatic defence turrets opened up, inflicting casualties but they were quickly silenced by the ZAFT mobile suits due to the lack of swift and proper support. Out to sea, large numbers of submarines surfaced and launched their DINNs while others remained submerged to launch GOOhNs and ZnOs, even as more GINNs and CGUEs free-fell from atmospheric carriers. The Alaskan Defence Force finally began to respond in force, but they were clearly outnumbered, with most of the forces supposed to be assigned to the defence of JOSH-A having been sent to Panama.

"Captain Sutherland; what's happening? Wasn't ZAFT's target supposed to be Panama?" Murrue asked her superior officer, not knowing the man was already well away from the doomed fortress.

"They've tricked us. They made us think their next target is Panama, but their real goal turned out to be Headquarters. We've no choice; we have to hold the line until reinforcements arrive. The Archangel is to launch immediately!" Captain Sutherland ordered, before the communication was cut.

"Captain, we have no chance of winning!" Ensign Neumann said, turning to face the captain. "We're vastly outnumbered, and it's unlikely we'll be able to hold the line long enough for reinforcements to arrive!"

"I know that!" Murrue said, sitting down on her command chair. "Even so, issue a Level One Battle Alert, and prepare to engage! What's the status of the Strike's maintenance?"

"The left leg is still detached! It can't fight yet!"

"Damn it! Then we'll have to make do without it for now. Launch the Archangel!"

* * *

"What's the situation?" Mineva demanded as she entered the Zeon Command Centre. The control personnel were already hard at work, monitoring ZAFT and Alliance communications as well as overseeing the defence lines and communication shrouds around and over Side 3. The Prime Minister was there as well, talking to the Chief of Staff.

"Your Highness ZAFT has launched a massive offensive against Earth Alliance Headquarters." The latter replied after a salute, while the Prime Minister simply gave a bow. "As best we can tell, they're throwing everything they've got against the fortress. As for the Alliance, they seem to have been caught with their back turned so to speak, with most of their readily available reinforcements already at or en route to Panama."

"What's your tactical prediction?" Mineva asked, transfixing the admiral with her gaze.

"At first glance, a complete ZAFT victory." The man replied after a short pause. "However, the PLANT leadership is blinded by their belief in their complete and utter superiority over the Naturals, even more so now that Patrick Zala is in control. I find it unlikely that the Earth Alliance would fall for such a basic diversionary tactic."

"So?"

"…the Second Battle of Jaburo." The admiral finally replied after a short pause, causing the young Sovereign's eyes to widen in horror before they narrowed in disgust.

"Patrick Zala is a fool…" she spat. "…he's throwing away the lives of his men in the depths of his arrogant blindness. The man is no different from my accursed uncle."

"To be fair your Highness Patrick Zala's wife did die in the Bloody Valentine…" a nearby officer attempted to intercede only for the Sovereign to interrupt.

"That is no excuse." Mineva said firmly. "If he really is driven by revenge rather than being motivated by the needs of his nation, then the man is nothing more than a pathetic excuse for a military commander, much less a national leader."

"There is another issue though, your Highness." A nearby officer said, causing all eyes to turn to him.

"According to our data, all the troops and officers sent to Panama were from the Atlantic Federation." The man continued. "The rest of the Alaskan Defence Force personnel left behind are composed of Eurasians. Given that both the Eurasians and the East Asians are on the brink of military exhaustion, then even if the Alliance annihilates the ZAFT attackers, the Atlantic Federation will have gained complete control of the Earth Forces."

"And by extension, so will Blue Cosmos." Mineva said softly while nodding thoughtfully before smiling. The smile caused several of the older officers to raise eyebrows, as for a moment it seemed to them that Haman Karn was standing among them once again. "I'm impressed; if this is true then Blue Cosmos and the Atlantic Federation are certainly craftier than I ever expected from a bunch of fanatics. They may yet become our long-term enemies, but for now our concern will be that insane 'superman' holding court in PLANT."

"But the question remains…" the Prime Minister pointed out. "…N-Jammers ensure that nuclear weapons cannot be used, apart from our own laser-detonated fusion explosives, so how does the Alliance intend to destroy the attackers?"

As all eyes turned to the massive displays in the command centre, Mineva voiced everyone's answer. "Well, we'll just have to wait and see what the Alliance has up its sleeve."

* * *

Ra Le Creuset was standing in the Joint Operations Room, hacking his way through the firewalls until he finally found what he was looking for, causing him to smile cruelly. Then he quickly turned and fired off several shots from his SMG, causing Mu to duck back behind the door frame. "I'm certainly surprised to see you here, Mu La Flaga!" Rau taunted, his gun still aimed at the door. "But if you're here then it must mean your usefulness to the Earth Alliance has reached its end. Oh 'Hawk of Endymion' how the mighty have fallen!"

"Shut up!" Mu shouted back, before jumping out and firing off several shots, but the masked man had already fled through another door. Running over to the console Rau was using, he was shocked and horrified by what he saw. "This is…damn it I need to get to the Archangel!"

* * *

"Gottfried, Valiant, fire…!" Murrue ordered, and a moment later, the guns fired, destroying several of the slow-in-atmosphere GINNs and CGUEs. "What's the status of the fleet?"

"The Defence Fleet is at seventy percent combat capability!"

"Has there been any word from Panama or the Joint Operations Room?"

"None; all channels are repeating the same orders: hold position and await reinforcements!"

"Reinforcements my ass…" Neumann shouted in frustration as he banked the ship to evade several incoming missiles which were shot down by the Archangel's point defence guns. "…if they don't get here in the next hour, then all they'll be able to do is to bury our bodies!"

"This is Kira in the Strike!" Kira cut in all of a sudden. "I'm ready to go!"

"Launch immediately…!" Murrue began to order when an alarm caught her attention.

"Captain, we have multiple DINNs closing from port!"

"Wombats and Hell Darts, fire…!"

* * *

Mu La Flaga ran out of the elevator and into the hangar even as a nearby explosion filled the area with smoke. Coughing, he ran up to a nearby Spearhead but not before telling an NCO to evacuate as soon as possible, only for the shell-shocked man to run screaming.

"I guess I'm not really cut out to be a hero…" he lamented, turning on the aircraft when something tugged at his mind. Instinctively, he fired a pair of missiles and destroyed an approaching DINN before it could even land in the hangar. "…although I have to say these Newtype abilities sure do come in handy!"

* * *

Rau stepped out of custom-coloured DINN and back into the flagship submarine. "Commander…!" he heard someone shout out to him, and he turned to see Yzak leaning against the rail while the Duel was being resupplied nearby. "…back so soon?"

Rau raised an eyebrow at Yzak's slightly sarcastic question; the young man had been increasingly taciturn recently, and had been heard whispering doubts about the way the war was going. Rau inwardly sighed, the boy would have made a useful pawn, but it seemed he was starting to think for himself and would have to be dealt with accordingly. The boy was smart, and apparently was starting to suspect him of ulterior motives, though he couldn't understand why.

"Yzak, once your unit is finished with maintenance, you are to proceed to the main gate; with the presence of the legged ship, our forces have thus far been unable to break through." He ordered, ignoring the boy's earlier question.

"Understood, Commander…" Yzak coldly responded with a salute.

* * *

"Where…there it is…!" Mu said triumphantly, seeing the Archangel and what was left of the Defence Fleet holding around the main gate, with the Strike flying around trying to keep the ZAFT mobile suits back. Not that it really mattered of course; most of the auxiliary gates had already fallen, and a significant number of ZAFT units had already entered the fortress. And that wasn't taking the Cyclops System into account. But even as Mu banked and changed course for the Archangel, a DINN began to fire at him, one of the shots clipping and damaging his unit.

* * *

"Captain, we have a friendly unit closing!"

"What the…is he actually trying to land?" Murrue stammered out in shock before she opened a line to Sergeant Murdock. "Hurry and get the crash gear up; some crazy ass pilot's trying to land!"

"I only have one shot at this…" Mu growled as he piloted his unit into the Archangel's port hangar and crash landed with an all but bone-breaking sensation. Without waiting for any prompting, he jumped out of the cockpit to the surprise of all the tech crews and ran all the way to the bridge.

"What the hell are you doing here?" Murrue shouted at him, though her eyes seemed to brighten at the sight of him. Gratifying though that was, Mu knew he didn't have any time to waste.

"Captain we have to get out of here!" he told her to her shock and surprise. "We've been tricked, all of us! The skeleton defence forces left here are only meant to be bait to draw ZAFT in to be destroyed by a Cyclops System right under the fortress! I've seen it myself; the Joint Operations Room is completely deserted!"

"Captain, the Defence Fleet is at forty-five percent combat capability!"

"But that's…" Murrue stammered out, in shock at the betrayal by their superiors.

"Captain…!"

Making a decision and gritting her teeth, she snarled out "Signal all ships, commence retreat! We've done all we can here, and now we're to focus all our efforts in breaking out of the ZAFT blockade!"

"I'm heading out as well." Mu said with a nod, before turning and leaving the bridge.

* * *

Ten minutes later the Duel was in hot pursuit of the retreating Alliance ships led by the Archangel; with their retreat, the main gate had fallen surprisingly quickly, and ZAFT mobile suits poured into the underground fortress. Spotting the Strike, Yzak piloted his unit towards the other G-Weapon, firing his beam rifle several times. The Strike dodged all his shots before returning fire, soon the two G-Weapons were trading fire as they circled one another, leaving Mu and his Sky Grasper alone to defend the Archangel.

"The Defence Fleet is at thirty percent combat capability! Captain, at this rate we won't last before we can get out of the Cyclops' effective area!"

"Open a channel to all ships, both ZAFT and the Alliance!" she desperately ordered in response, much to the shock of the entire bridge crew.

"But captain…!"

"Do you want to die?"

"…channel is open."

"This is Captain Murrue Ramius of the former Earth Alliance vessel Archangel. All combat units withdraw from the combat zone immediately! A Cyclops System is on standby and will fire shortly under the fortress! I repeat…"

"What an obvious trick!" Yzak shouted, drawing a beam sabre and engaging the Strike in close quarters combat.

"Do you want to die that badly?" Kira shouted back, struggling to defend himself against his fellow Coordinator.

* * *

But it was already too late; at that moment, aboard an Alliance submarine well away from the battlefield, two keys were slid into activation consoles.

"It is my hope that this act will bring about a quick end to this war." The admiral holding one key said.

"For the sake of our blue and pure world…" Captain Sutherland whispered as he held the other key. "…three, two, one..." At the same time, the two men turned their keys and activated the Cyclops System. Immediately, intense microwave radiation began to surge out from deep underground.

* * *

"We've detected powerful microwaves from underneath the fortress…Captain, it's the Cyclops!"

"All ships, all ahead full!"

"Oh shit! All units, full retreat!" Yzak ordered in horror as his sensors also detected the intense radiation. Across the battlefield, all Alliance and ZAFT personnel turned to flee, only for their bodies to be reduced to bloody vapour in moments, followed seconds later by their vehicles, ships, and aircraft exploding as the intense radiation affected them as well. ZAFT mobile suits were no exception either, and Yzak found his Guul getting clipped by the radiation surge. "Oh shit!" he shouted as the Guul exploded and the Duel began to fall back into the radiation.

"Hang on, I've got you!" Kira said, catching the Duel's hand and dragging it behind the Strike through the air back to the Archangel.

"Oh man..." Yzak lamented, opening his visor and rubbing his eyes wearily. "…getting saved by my rival; I am never going to live this down." Behind them, the entire fortress and the surrounding landscape exploded in nuclear fire from the sheer intensity of the radiation surge.

* * *

"No…" the captain of the ZAFT flagship said, looking at the screen showing the complete destruction of not just JOSH-A, but approximately eighty percent of their deployed forces.

"…it would seem that we have fallen into the Earth Forces' trap." Rau Le Creuset said with his typical calmness, though no one noticed the faint but satisfied smile that graced the ZAFT Commander's face for a moment.

* * *

A/N

I wonder if this chapter was rushed…tell me, and if it is, I'll edit it.


	15. Chapter 15

Disclaimer: I do not own any characters, names, and any copyrighted material used in this work. This is a fanfic, period. Everything belongs to their respective owners. Comments and constructive criticism are all very much appreciated.

Chapter 14: Reunions

The Archangel flew low over the ocean, while the Sky Grasper, the Duel, and the Strike sat on a small and rocky islet nearby. Mu La Flaga stood near his plane and watched the aurora play a stark dissonance on the brilliant blue sky while a mushroom cloud slowly dissipated over the irradiated crater that was once JOSH-A. There was no doubt about it; the Alliance had known all along that JOSH-A was ZAFT's target, and everyone who hadn't been sent elsewhere by the time the attack had taken place had been left to die as bait to draw ZAFT into the Cyclops' maw. The only question was how did the Alliance know the exact time ZAFT was going to attack? He still lacked experience with his Newtype abilities, but somehow he knew Rau Le Creuset was behind all this.

Tossing away his helmet in disgust at the inhumanity that had just taken place he looked behind him and saw the ZAFT pilot walking cautiously towards Kira, who was also waiting cautiously for the other Coordinator to come within earshot. Spotting several soldiers from the Archangel walk briskly towards the pair, he gave a signal to them not to interfere, causing them to stop with a look of surprise at the man.

"Are you a Coordinator?" Yzak asked the moment he came within earshot of the Strike's pilot.

"Yes I am; I'm a First Generation Coordinator." Kira replied, getting tired of the same question being asked over and over again. The ZAFT pilot raised an eyebrow before asking another question.

"Were you piloting the Strike all the way from Heliopolis?"

"That's right."

"I see…" the ZAFT pilot nodded in understanding, then faster than Kira expected lunged forward and slugged him on a cheek, sending Kira tumbling to the ground. The soldiers made to rush forward, but Mu barked at them to hold.

"That was for giving me this scar." Yzak told Kira, slowly drawing his sidearm…and placed it on the ground. "Don't worry; I have no intention of trying to get revenge for everyone you've killed. It's not like they'll come back if I kill you, and besides, what would that say about me?"

Smirking at the stunned expression on the Strike's pilot's face, Yzak turned and walked towards the Alliance soldiers, who stood aside and after a nod from Mu, escorted the Coordinator towards the Archangel. In the meantime, Mu walked towards Kira who was sitting up and nursing his bruised cheek. "You okay there kid?"

"Yeah, I'm fine." Kira replied. "The way that ZAFT pilot acted was certainly unexpected though."

"No kidding…" Mu said with his trademark playful smile. "…still, you should get that bruise looked at by your girlfriend. She's probably worried sick about you by now." Kira blushed and looked away, causing the older man to laugh.

* * *

Siegel Clyne looked at his daughter in concern as they sat in one of the Starlight Wanderer's passenger cabins. The girl wasn't eating well, wasn't talking much, and spent much of her time looking at her surroundings with a glazed look in her eyes. He sighed, thinking how Lacus' depression displayed volumes about how Coordinators weren't all that different from Naturals in the end. He hoped she would brighten up soon, seeing Lacus like this was all but unbearable, though at the moment his concern was getting to Side 3 as soon as possible. True, the Principality wasn't very friendly with PLANT, but it was because of that fact that he was all but certain they wouldn't mind taking in a few political refugees.

"Mr Clyne…" Andrew Waltfeld, the Desert Tiger, said as he entered the cabin with a worried expression on his face. "…it seems our departure has been noticed. According to our friends in ZAFT, the Nazca-class Destroyer Pliny the Younger has been sent to pursue us and bring you back to PLANT in custody to answer suspicion charges of treason."

"Patrick…is there no end to this?" Siegel sighed wearily at the thought of his old friend. "Can we get to Side 3 before they catch up with us?"

"Hmm…" the Desert Tiger thought for several moments before giving an answer. "…yes, but only just. The Starlight Wanderer is fast, but not that fast. They'll be in mobile suit range by the time we enter Zeon territorial airspace, and they just might try and take advantage of that by disabling our engines and towing us back to be boarded."

"Do you have anything in mind?"

"We could go to the Moon, but the Lunar Base is definitely not an option, and Copernicus would probably bow to pressure from Zala to hand us over. Earth is too far, and we'd never get to the surface in any case. Side 3 is our only real option. Perhaps if we broadcast an open message on all channels, we could draw the attention of a Zeon patrol…"

"Do it; we have to get to Side 3 no matter what, if only for Lacus' sake at the least."

* * *

"Yzak, you're alive!" Nicol said somewhat redundantly, though Yzak was gratified to see the happy expression on his friend and fellow pilot's face at the sight of him alive and well.

"Yes, so I am." He replied as the guards closed the cell and left the detention block. "I'm surprised to see you alive as well, Nicol. Is Dearka here as well?"

Nicol's face fell, and he took a while to reply. "I'm sorry Yzak, but Dearka…"

"I see, so he didn't survive…" Yzak sighed, lying down on his bunk. "…how have the Naturals been treating you?"

"Well enough, I suppose, for a prisoner that is. I've heard rumours from the guards though; is it true ZAFT attacked JOSH-A instead of Panama?"

"It's true." Yzak confirmed. "But it was a trap; the Alliance knew we were coming, and built a Cyclops System under the fortress. Almost all our forces were wiped out, and I probably would have died as well, had the Strike's pilot not saved me. It seems that Chairman Zala underestimated the Naturals; they're not nearly as stupid as most of us think."

Nicol smiled at that, wryly noting that until a while ago, Yzak was one of those who considered Naturals as inferior beings. "You know, the Strike's pilot isn't so bad. His name is Kira Yamato by the way, and apparently he's a First Generation Coordinator…"

"I know…" Yzak interrupted. "…I asked him before I surrendered. I punched him too, just to pay him back for this little scar on my face."

Nicol laughed heartily at that, and Yzak grinned despite himself. "Well, I see some things never change, Yzak. And they shouldn't either." Nicol told him after he had regained his composure. "So, where do you think we're headed?"

"Probably Panama…but that's very unlikely." Yzak replied, frowning thoughtfully. "They tried to warn us you know. It was a little too late, but this ship's captain did say they were a 'former' Earth Alliance vessel, so I think everyone defending the fortress was deliberately left unaware and were meant to die there. As for this ship, well, there's a Coordinator among the crew, so the commanders must have thought the crew 'tainted'. They probably have the combat data too, so the Strike isn't all that important either."

"So…?"

"To be honest Nicol, I really don't know."

* * *

"I say we go to Orb." Mu said to everyone on the bridge. In addition to the bridge crew, also present were Kira and his girlfriend, though Miriallia was still confined to sick bay, having turned suicidal during their short stay in JOSH-A. "We could go to Panama, I suppose, but I'd bet everything I own that we'd probably be charged with desertion if we re-join the Alliance, and even if we don't we know too much. We'd be congratulated and then get sent on a suicide mission."

"But Orb is a neutral nation." Ensign Neumann countered. "Would they even allow us to enter their territory?"

"Normally no, but it's not like we have much choice either." Murrue said, clearly supportive of the idea of going to Orb. "If we declare ourselves as defectors, then they'd probably let us in. The Archangel is a top-of-the-line warship, to say nothing of three G-Weapons, even if one of them is rather inoperable at the moment."

"I agree…" Kira said, with Flay nodding her support. "…and besides, Cagalli is in Orb as well. I'm sure she probably has enough influence to allow us to take refuge in her country."

"It's settled then: we go to Orb."

* * *

"A message is being broadcast on all channels?" the Endra-class' captain asked in bemusement as he floated into the bridge. They had been conducting performance tests on Warrant Officer Murasame's Gaplant while on patrol, and should be heading back to Side 3 in a few hours.

"It's fragmentary, but from what we gather, it seems that it's from a refugee ship carrying political refugees." The XO explained as he ceded command back to the captain, who sat down on the command chair.

"If they are political refugees, then it's probably in our best interests if we take them in." the captain decided. "But only and only if they've entered Zeon airspace; so long as they remain in interplanetary space, there's nothing we can do. Can we home in on their location?"

"We already have, sir."

"Good; change course accordingly, and have all mobile suits standby for launch."

* * *

"They're damn persistent!" Waltfeld said angrily in the Starlight Wanderer's bridge. "We're already well within Zeon airspace, but they still keep on coming!" The civilian yacht was travelling as fast as it could along a zigzagging course in attempt to shake the six GINNs pursuing it, but all to no avail. If it weren't for the fact that they intended to bring the ship and everyone aboard back to PLANT to face 'justice', they'd probably be destroyed already.

"Any response from the Principality?" he asked desperately.

"Negative; we are broadcasting on all frequencies but…!" the man's reply was cut off when the ship shook violently, and alarms began to scream across the bridge. "Captain; our engines have been destroyed!"

"Damn…!" Waltfeld ground out as GINNs swarmed the ship and began to attach tow cables. "It's all over now."

At that exact same moment, one of the ZAFT pilots glanced at a beeping tactical display. "An approaching unit…but this speed…!" All the ZAFT mobile suits turned to face the way of the approaching unit, and spotted its glowing exhaust trail. "…a mobile armour? And a new model at that?" the squad leader said in surprise as another pilot fired off his 76mm machine gun several times. To their surprise, the mobile armour dodged all the incoming shots with impressive skill and speed.

"This is our territory, you damn fascists. Get the hell out!" Murasame Seven spat as he increased his Gaplant's speed even further towards the scattering ZAFT mobile suits; transforming at the last moment, he kicked a GINN in the torso with enough force to send the unit flying and momentarily stunning the pilot. Simultaneously, he aimed his left beam rifle and fired with pinpoint accuracy, destroying a GINN.

The first GINN had recovered by this point; drawing its sword, it charged the Gaplant and swung down…only for the Gaplant to grab the GINN's wrist and prevented it from completing the swing while simultaneously activating a beam sabre of its own and literally bisected the GINN with terrifying ease. As the GINN exploded and the Gaplant backed away, the four remaining GINNs closed in…only for three of them to go off explosively as yellow beams tore them apart.

"If you don't want to die, then stay the hell out of my way!" Sophie Fran roared, wildly but accurately firing her beam machine gun as she piloted her Geara Doga at high speed towards the ZAFT vessel. The last GINN made to pursue, but stopped and turned as it detected another mobile suit approaching.

"Now then, won't you dance with me?" Ple Three asked playfully as she closed in and activated a beam sabre. Dodging the GINN's wide swing by flying down at the last moment, the Qubeley slashed upwards and cut off the GINN's arms at the elbows before she kicked the unit away from her. "He's yours, Murasame!"

Murasame didn't bother to respond verbally, simply stabbing the helpless GINN through the back before flying past the exploding mobile suit. Tapping the side of his helmet, Murasame pondered the voice screaming at the back of his head telling him that he was killing his own people. He shrugged, discarding it as some sort of echo of his Cyber-Newtype conditioning. "Glory to the Zeon empire." He whispered, smiling as the nationalistic pride invoked by the words silenced the annoying voice in his head.

At the same time, Sophie Fran soared towards the Pliny the Younger, dodging missiles and bullets with deceptive recklessness. "Sieg Zeon!" she roared, firing a grenade into the ZAFT vessel's hangar, tearing the ship apart from the inside out.

* * *

Andrew Waltfeld was aghast at the sight; six GINNs piloted by veteran pilots, destroyed by only three units? Granted, ZAFT pilots only had experience fighting against mobile armours, but still…

"Refugee vessel, what's your situation? This is Lieutenant Junior Grade Elpeo Ple the Third of the Zeon Newtype Corps, please respond."

"Yes, this is Captain Andrew Waltfeld, commanding the Starlight Wanderer." He replied after a moment. "Our engines are down and we have political refugees aboard."

"Understood, standby and hold position until our ship arrives."

Sighing as the communication was cut Waltfeld looked at the Zeon mobile suits flying around outside the vessel and sincerely hoped that Patrick Zala didn't court the Principality's wrath, and shuddered at the thought of facing them in combat.

* * *

"Thank you for your assistance; if not for you and your pilots, I sincerely doubt we'd survive whatever Zala has in store for us." Siegel Clyne thanked the Endra-class' captain as they stood in the Zeon ship's hangar. The disabled Starlight Wanderer was awaiting a civilian tugboat to tow it back to Side 3, but in the meantime they would be taken to Deikun City as guests of the Zeon Navy.

"It's no trouble at all, though you were lucky that they took action in Zeon airspace." The captain responded, shaking Siegel's offered hand. "If you had been in interplanetary space, we'd have been unable to do anything at all."

"Well, luck is part of the battle. Not by much, but it's there." Waltfeld said cheerfully, and the captain chuckled in response.

"Oh I agree; Captain Andrew Walfeld, I presume?" the captain said; after Waltfeld nodded in response, he turned to the depressed…pink-head standing behind Siegel. "And this young lady is…?"

"My daughter, Lacus Clyne…" Siegel introduced her, but looked apologetically at the captain immediately afterwards. "…you have to make allowances for her. She's been depressed ever since her fiancé went MIA."

"I see; rest assured, I understand." The captain said before reasonably changing the topic. "Perhaps you'd care to meet the pilots who saved your lives?"

"Yes, of course."

Making a gesture, after a few moments, three pilots were floating down from nearby where they had been checking over their units. Lacus gasped, her eyes widening in recognition and her hands flying up to cover her mouth even as Siegel's eyes also widened in recognition; the eyes were colder than before, but both the eyes and the hairstyle were the same: it was the supposedly MIA Athrun Zala.

"These are Lieutenant Sophie Fran, Lieutenant…" the captain began to introduce the pilots when he was interrupted.

"Athrun…it really is you, isn't it? But what are you doing here?" Lacus said, floating over to Murasame who looked at her with surprise clearly evident on his face.

"No disrespect intended, my lady, but I think you've confused me for someone else." He said, uncomfortably stepping back, causing Lacus to also step back with a gasp of horror.

"What's going on here?" Siegel said, outraged at the possibility of Athrun Zala having kidnapped and brainwashed for some unknown reason by the Principality.

"I assure you sir, I have absolutely no idea what is going on." The captain said in a placating manner.

"But that person is…!" Siegel began to say when Waltfeld placed his remaining hand on Siegel's shoulder reassuringly.

"Perhaps this shouldn't be unexpected." He interjected. While he too was suspicious about the whole situation, the look of confusion on all the Zeon personnel present was genuine. Which could of course mean either they weren't told by their superiors…or something else entirely. "The Principality is from a parallel universe to our own. Perhaps that kid is Athrun Zala's parallel self, with naturally different memories and personality. To be honest, that is the most rational explanation here."

"No, that's Athrun! My Athrun…!" Lacus protested loudly, jumping at the Cyber-Newtype who looked at her confusedly. "You remember me don't you? Please Athrun, come back to me!"

"Lacus, he's not Athrun!" Siegel shouted as Waltfeld leapt forwards.

"Murasame…!" Ple Three shouted out at the confused Cyber-Newtype before floating towards him followed by a confused-looking Sophie.

"Lacus, calm down! He's not Athrun, no matter how much he looks like him." Waltfeld said soothingly, pulling her away from the Cyber-Newtype, who was now surrounded by his two fellow pilots.

"Captain, I apologize for this disturbance. Perhaps it would be best…" Siegel told the captain, but the man had already caught on to the situation.

"I understand sir." He said, making a gesture at the three pilots, who nodded and left.

"What the hell was that about?" Sophie said, shaking her head.

"I have absolutely no idea." Murasama said, ignoring the screaming at the back of his head. "It seems that my counterpart in this universe was involved with that girl…lucky bastard."

"Yeah well, you have me, so I say you're luckier than he was." Ple Three said smugly, causing Murasame and Sophie to chuckle in amusement.

"No…! Athrun, come back!" Lacus shrieked hysterically, Siegel, Waltfeld, and ZAFT and Zeon personnel struggling to restrain her. "What have they done to you? Athrun…!"

* * *

A/N

That's the longest chapter I've done so far for this work…still, I wonder if I was too cruel to Lacus? Was she too OOC (though given what she's been through that shouldn't be surprising)?


	16. Chapter 16

Disclaimer: I do not own any characters, names, and any copyrighted material used in this work. This is a fanfic, period. Everything belongs to their respective owners. Comments and constructive criticism are all very much appreciated.

Chapter 15: The Land of Peace in Flames Part 1

"_Where the hell am I?" Murasame Seven asked himself, looking around in confusion. The last thing he remembered was lying down to sleep in his bunk, and now found himself standing along the grassy banks of what appeared to be a lake he had never been to before. It was a colony though; he knew that much considering the faintly visible glass walls in the distance. "A dream…?" he asked, walking down to the lake, staring down at his reflection._

"_Hmm…" he murmured before he smiled, and with a thought his reflection changed to incorporate an officer's cape and gold embroidery. "…yes, much better indeed." He said, striking a pose as he did so._

"_I see you're enjoying yourself." Someone dryly said from behind him. Drawing his sidearm, he whirled, the gun aimed at the person standing behind him, before his eyes widened in shock at the sight. He was pointing his gun at himself! Or at least it looked like himself, only wearing what appeared to be a custom Titan/EFF uniform._

"_Who the hell are you?" he growled, his eyes narrowing._

"_I am you. And I'm taking my body back!" the apparition told him, before the landscape shattered like glass and he fell into the darkness._

"_Ple…!"_

Elpeo Ple the Third was floating down the hallway from the mess hall in her off-duty clothes, happily humming to herself. Although she knew it was unhealthy, and had been told as much, that didn't stop her gobbling up ice cream like a sponge sucked up water whenever she could. She was just heading back to her cabin when she found herself raising an eyebrow at the sight of Murasame speeding around the next intersection wearing nothing more than a shirt and boxers.

"Mu…!" she was about to call out to him when her senses told her that the person she was seeing in front of her was not her fellow pilot. Growling to herself, she dampened her presence with her powers, before boosting off the deck with a kick.

So focused as he was getting to the Clynes' cabins, coupled with Ple Three's psionic dampening, Athrun Zala never noticed the female Cyber-Newtype close in and grab his collar from behind, throwing him to the deck. And no matter how fast a trained Coordinator was normally, a psionic attack moved even faster, Ple Three forcing herself into the Coordinator's mind at the speed of thought.

"_Damn Titan…_" she mentally snarled. "…_I won't let you have Murasame!"_

"_Ple…!" _she mentally heard and saw Murasame respond in the depths of his mind; encouraged, she formed a lance of pure mental power, and grabbed onto it along with her friend, smiling at the sight of him wearing an officer's uniform. "_...let's do this, Murasame!_" she replied, and together they hurled the psionic lance with deadly intent at the red-uniformed 'Titan' currently in control, ripping Athrun Zala's consciousness apart in an instant.

With a gasp, Ple Three sprang back, blood streaming from her nostrils, hands instinctively going to her temples in response to the piercing pain in her head. "I'm not doing so good either…" Murasame Seven said redundantly, sitting up on the deck with his hands clutching the back of his head. "…but still, thanks for bringing me back, Ple."

"No problem…" she weakly replied with a smile.

Pulling himself together, he moved to assist her. "Hang on I'll take you to sick bay."

"I can get there myself…" she said, pinching her nose to stop the bleeding and pointing at Murasame, who looked down in puzzlement before turning red. "…while you have to go back to your room and get dressed before you can go anywhere."

"Whoa! Damn it, what the hell was that moron thinking, going out dressed like this!" he said in outraged embarrassment, turning redder while Ple Three was shaking with suppressed laughter. "If we get seen like this, people will think I'm sexually harassing you."

"Of course, seeing as I'm older, they could also think it was the other way round." She said playfully as she boosted off the deck in the direction of the sick bay. Her laughter echoed down the deck, accompanied by Murasame's spluttered protests.

* * *

Quattro watched the Archangel sail into Morgenroete's shielded underground dock through his sunglasses from the observation deck. He had heard of what had happened at JOSH-A, and how it had turned out like the AEUG's all-but-disastrous assault on Jaburo during the Gryps Conflict. The war was now turning in favour of the Earth Alliance, with the annihilation of a large portion of ZAFT's readily available forces, which might soon be followed by a full-scale assault on ZAFT's strongholds across the Earth and in space. There was just one problem with such a hypothesis: as far as he knew the Earth Alliance had yet to deploy mobile suits en masse. Turning to leave the observation deck, he wondered how Mineva was planning to deal with this.

* * *

Cagalli Yula Athha walked down the ramp and into the Archangel before proceeding into the Archangel's bridge, where the ship's officers were waiting for her. "Captain Ramius…" she greeted the older woman as she entered the bridge. "…welcome back to Orb. My father wants to see you as soon as possible however I believe it best for me to fill you in on the situation first."

"Did something happen?" Murrue responded with a worried tone and expression.

"Well no, at least not in Orb." Cagalli replied grimly. "Shortly before you arrived, the ZAFT survivors from JOSH-A launched an assault on the Porta Panama spaceport. The reports are fragmentary, but apparently and despite the first mass deployment of Alliance mobile suits, ZAFT succeeded in destroying the spaceport. Furthermore, according to survivor testimony, ZAFT massacred any and all surrendering Alliance personnel they could find before they retreated."

"My God…" Murrue breathed in shock.

"If so…" Mu began to interject. "…then the Alliance will probably speed up its plans to reclaim the other spaceports before the Lunar Base exhausts its supplies. Either that, or ZAFT attempts to blockade the Lunar Base, which could lead to a confrontation with the Principality over the Allster Arrangement. Which would be disastrous to say the least; if the rumours are true, then Zeon has access to both mobile suits and nuclear weapons, to say nothing of their superior population and industry as compared to PLANT."

"My father will further elaborate on the situation." Cagalli concluded with a nod, before turning to leave the bridge. "I'll be waiting for you outside. We've already made arrangements regarding supplies, repair and maintenance, but for the moment, please confine your crew to the ship."

"So, what do you think?" Murrue asked Mu, turning to face the man who sighed before replying.

"I don't know. Even though we made it this far, I get the feeling we're still going to be pulled into the war regardless."

* * *

"Oh Lieutenant Quattro, it's good to see you again." Sergeant Murdock greeted the blonde as he arrived in the Archangel's MS hangar along with the Morgenroete tech crews. Quattro nodded in reply before turning his attention to the Duel and the seriously-damaged Blitz. "Transfer the Gundams to Morgenroete and prioritize their repairs. I'll handle the bureaucratic issues."

"…'Gundams', sir?" the lead technician for Morgenroete present asked in confusion.

"Oh that's right. Sorry, I meant the G-Weapons. Except for the Strike; leave that to the Archangel's crew."

"I understand sir." The technician responded before barking out the appropriate orders.

* * *

"Damn it all! Everything we gained from Alaska is meaningless now that we've lost all access to space!" one of the men sitting around a table in a bunker at a classified location in Atlantic Federation territory exploded, slamming a fist on the table in frustration.

"We've already accelerated preparations for retaking the Victoria spaceport, but even so it'll be a while before we can launch an attack with a reasonable chance of success, even with the depleted ZAFT forces in the region." Another man reasoned out. "We've also issued requests for support and cooperation from Orb, but that damn Uzumi Nara Athha keeps getting in the way!"

"Oh? Is that so now? That doesn't sound very reasonable to me." A bored-looking Muruta Azrael responded lazily. "Especially when you consider that we're fighting against 'Humanity's enemies'."

"I really wish you retain objectivity, Azrael." A third man said. "Not all of us here belong to Blue Cosmos."

"Even so, Orb is a part of Earth, isn't it?" Azrael countered with a shrug. "There's a reason our group is called the 'Earth Alliance'. If ZAFT wins this war, then not just the Alliance member states, but all nations here in the surface will have their interests compromised, won't they?"

"While that is true…" the second man said. "…Orb is a sovereign nation, and as such we can't just force them to cooperate."

"Is that so now?" Azrael said with a dangerous glint in his eyes, causing everyone around the table to abruptly sit up. "In that case, just leave Orb to me. You people can concentrate on Victoria; after all, why settle for just one mass driver, when we can have two?"

"What of the Principality?"

"We leave them alone." Azrael said firmly, with a tone that brooked no disagreement. "The Allster Arrangement is an excellent piece to bait ZAFT with; if ZAFT attempts to blockade the Lunar Base, it'll lead to an inevitable confrontation between PLANT and the Principality." With a feral smile that left everyone at the table extremely uncomfortable, Azrael stood up. "If the rumours are true, I want to see the power that killed an estimated three billion people in just one week unleashed. Even if we're not the ones holding the sword, those damn space monsters will die one way or another."

* * *

"What's with these demands?" Uzumi Nara Athha angrily asked redundantly, staring down at the document that had just arrived via diplomatic courier from the Atlantic Federation. "To think that they'd accuse us of being unreasonable and ignorant of the world's situation; damn the Atlantic Federation!"

"Lord Uzumi, an Earth Forces Fleet is already en route. ZAFT has also issued an offer for assistance. We need to decide what we need to do now."

"I will not, no, we cannot submit to these unjust and obviously biased demands!" Uzumi replied firmly. "If we were to join the Earth Alliance, then Orb would simply suffer the same fate as Panama did! And if were to accept ZAFT's offer, then we still face the Alliance's wrath!"

As the rest of the council looked at each other in confusion, Uzumi continued. "But that is we cannot allow Orb to be pulled into the affairs of either side, and be forced to give up our ideals so easily. To do so would be tantamount to become everything we would normally stand against, even more so now that the extremists have taken control of both sides in this conflict. Even if it means being forced to fight the Earth Forces, at the very least, we remain true to ourselves."

"I believe we should issue evacuation orders at the least." Another member of the council responded. "That way, even if we must pay the price for our defiance of both ZAFT and the Alliance, then our people will not have to pay for our decision to make a stand for what we believe in."

* * *

"As you may know…" Murrue told the crew assembled before her in the Archangel's MS hangar. "…Orb has made the decision to reject both the Alliance's demands and ZAFT's offer, and as such, will soon be forced into a confrontation with the Earth Forces. Furthermore, as we are now effectively deserters and traitors, this ship will have to involve itself in the defence if Orb."

Sparing a moment to let the crew mutter among themselves, she continued. "I understand that some among you may find the idea of fighting the Earth Forces uncomfortable, and I will not hold it against you if you decide to leave the ship; should you choose to do so, then please take action as per the Orb government's evacuation order."

Smiling sadly, she bowed to the crew. "I understand that I haven't been the best captain up until now, and I'd like to take this chance to thank you all for putting up with me all this time."

* * *

Azrael found himself laughing as he stood on the flagship carrier's bridge after reading the Orb government's response. "So, my demands are unjust and unreasonable, and as such are unacceptable, are they now? Oh Uzumi Nara Athha, I am so glad that you refused to submit to the given demands. Thanks to you, we now have the chance to test our new G-Weapons. I certainly hope you'll be able to put up a good show."

Turning to the fleet commander, he said "Admiral, commence final preparations. We will commence the attack in a few hours."

* * *

"I see, so you're leaving the ship as well." Sai said to Miriallia, who nodded sadly in response.

"I'm sorry, but I can't go on like this." She said with a downcast look. "Everything about this ship, they all remind me of Tolle. That's why…"

"It's alright, Miri…" Sai told her comfortingly. "…you don't need to explain it to me. I hope we'll be able to meet each other again when this is all over."

"I hope so too…bye…" she said with a forced smile. Picking up her bag and giving a wave, she turned and left, Sai looking after her with a worried expression on his face.

* * *

"Here you go." Flay said, tossing the confused Yzak and Nicol their pilot suits. "We're no longer with the Earth Forces, and Orb is neutral, so we can't keep you with us anymore."

"Huh? Hey wait, what is this supposed to mean?" Yzak asked belligerently.

"Basically what I said." The redhead told him. "You might want to join the evacuation seeing as the Earth Forces will soon be attacking."

"What?" Nicol said in shock.

"They demanded that Orb join the Alliance or be forcibly occupied." Flay replied, looking at the ZAFT pilots with a measuring look. "Orb chose the latter."

"So, they're making a stand." Yzak said conclusively, nodding in understanding and internally impressed and highly respectful of Orb's determination in the face of overwhelming odds. "What about you?"

"I'm staying with the Archangel, obviously." Flay said, turning to leave. "Even if I'm not from Orb, Kira is with this ship. So long as he's with them, I'm staying. I won't be separated from him, not if I can help it."

"What about our units?" Yzak asked before she could leave the detention block.

"Morgenroete has them." The reply ghosted back, causing Yzak to grimace and Nicol to sigh.

* * *

"Ah, Lieutenant Quattro…" Erica greeted the man, already wearing his pilot suit. "…as per your specifications, we've completed your custom unit just in time." Pressing a remote, she opened an MS container exposing the red and black Astray waiting for its pilot. "We've reinforced the body, increased the engine output to twice normal, applied anti-beam coating to the armour surface, and increased the beam rifle's output by sixty percent. However, be warned: this will drain your unit's power supply much faster than normal. I trust this is satisfactory?"

"It is; you have my thanks, Engineer Simmons." Quattro answered with genuine gratitude, giving a nod.

"So that's the lieutenant's unit?" one of the Astray Girls commented as they arrived, also wearing pilot suits. "It looks…dangerous."

"That's the idea." Quattro said, looking at the girls. "You three will be piloting under me out there. Whatever you do, don't get reckless. Now, head to your units; it's only a matter of minutes before the Alliance launches its attack."

* * *

"It's time; commence the attack." Azrael said, looking at his watch while standing on the Alliance flagship. In response, the fleet commander gave the word, and the fleet commenced the preliminary missile bombardment; although many of the missiles were shot down by Orb AA-defences, most of missiles hit their mark, inflicting serious losses on the Orb defence emplacements. Meanwhile, Strike Dagger mobile suits and Spearhead fighters began to launch from the Alliance carriers, even as Orb warships sailed from their docks and Astrays launched from the MS hangars. Orb linear artillery began to fire the counter-bombardment, while the Archangel launched from Morgenroete, aboard which the Strike and Mu's Astray were undergoing final launch preparations.

"Listen up you three." Azrael told the three Extended Humans piloting the new G-Weapons about to launch. Whatever you do, don't you dare damage Morgenroete or the mass driver."

"But it's fine if we blow up everything else, right?" Orga Sabnak asked in response.

"That's fine by me, so long as we get to go all out on everything else." Clotho Buer responded.

"Sure, why not?" Shani Andras answered stoically.

* * *

A/N

The Cosmic Era has heard about the One Year War, though they don't the details…yet. But they know enough, enough to make Azrael start to salivate at the thought of getting his hands on G3 Nerve Gas. And yes, there's chemistry going on between Ple Three and Murasame Seven.

And finally, as much as I hate to admit it, Azrael is so cool. Even when he starts toting nukes, I feel the urge to sit back, eat some popcorn, and enjoy the show with him. No idea why though...and he'll still die, given his gravity-weighed down soul.


	17. Chapter 17

Disclaimer: I do not own any characters, names, and any copyrighted material used in this work. This is a fanfic, period. Everything belongs to their respective owners. Comments and constructive criticism are all very much appreciated.

Chapter 16: The Land of Peace in Flames Part 2

The missiles fell like rain, turning buildings and vehicles into blossoms of flame and debris, and immolating anyone unfortunate enough to get caught within their area-of-effect. In their wake, the Strike Dagger squads moved in, firing off a storm of beams to pave the way for their advance.

Orb linear artillery opened up the counter-attack, blunting the Alliance assault and buying time for the Astray squads to form up and halt the enemy advance. Across the entire front, Astrays clashed with Strike Daggers, engaging from range for the most part, but at times closing to engage with beam sabres. At range, the two units were more or less equal, but the Strike Dagger's lighter armour (and thus increased agility) allowed it to outclass the Astray in hand-to-hand combat. At the same time, warships of both sides clashed out at sea, the Alliance vessels supported by Spearhead formations, while the Archangel hung back and singlehandedly formed a secondary line behind the cruisers and destroyers of the Orb fleet.

A beam lanced into a Strike Dagger and blew it apart, a red and black Astray landing solidly nearby immediately afterwards. Sparing a momentary glance at the nearby power indicator, Quattro cursed unhappily. "It's not the unit's fault…" he growled. "…it's just the sheer difference in technical prowess between two worlds!" Another Strike Dagger charged in, its beam sabre drawn, only to have its slash blocked by Quattro's shield. Simultaneously, he fired the face-mounted 75mm Vulcan cannons, ripping the Strike Dagger's head apart and causing it to tumble down to the ground backwards.

"No way…how can he use his Vulcan cannons so accurately?" another Alliance pilot commented in disbelief at the sight. This lapse in attention would cost him dearly, Quattro smoothly taking aim and firing his beam rifle, destroying the GM-lookalike with ease.

Nearby, the Astray Girls were ripping the Strike Dagger squads apart. Asagi fired her rifle twice, blowing apart two Strike Daggers with precise strikes. Then, at the same time, both Juri and Asagi turned to face each other before firing over each other's shoulders, destroying Strike Daggers attempting to attack them from behind. Meanwhile, Mayura blocked a Strike Dagger's beam sabre with her shield before firing her Vulcan cannons and riddling the Alliance unit with bullets from head-to-toe, springing back just before the doomed mobile suit exploded. Without skipping a beat, she turned and fired, destroying another Strike Dagger to her right even as it began to aim its beam rifle.

"Amazing; and there I was thinking that Lieutenant Quattro was just being crazy with training." Juri said with a tone of wonder. "Looks like all that training is finally paying off."

"What training?" Asagi said playfully. "More like brutally 'killing' us again and again until we learned how to use our units the way they should be used."

"If this is how they fought in the Universal Century…" Mayura concluded. "…then I shudder at the thought of how the Alliance and ZAFT would fare in general against the factions of the Universal Century."

"Well in that case, we don't have to have worry about anything." Asagi said with a mockingly-wise nod, all the while shooting down several missiles with her Vulcan cannons. "I'm pretty sure we'd be able to hold our own over there in the Universal Century if we have to."

"What are you three doing just standing over there?" Quattro put in, startling the three girls, although he allowed himself a faint smile at the way the three of them were piloting so well. "The battle's just getting started, don't get distracted!"

* * *

"Yzak, this battle…?" Nicol asked his former commander, watching the explosions and crisscrossing beams from a relatively distant cliff.

"It's no concern of ours." Yzak replied, but he refused to look at either Nicol or at the battlefield.

"But…"

"Hey, wait a minute don't tell me you're actually thinking of helping those guys?"

"They may be doing well for now, but it's only a matter of time before the Alliance's superior numbers overpower them." Nicol said, his attention still fixed on the battle between Orb and the Alliance. "And when that happens…"

Yzak growled in his throat, before turning to walk away. "Let's go, Nicol."

"Yzak…!"

"Morgenroete is this way isn't it?"

* * *

"You know what I see?" Clotho asked rhetorically with an insane smirk. "…targets!"

"I get first blood!" Orga said in response, before firing the Calamity's shoulder-mounted cannons followed by the chest-mounted cannon repeatedly, obliterating no less than three Astray squads before they could even register their presence. Jumping off of the Raider, the Calamity landed amidst the ruins of what had once been a factory, before firing all its weapons simultaneously and annihilated another squad.

"A G-Weapon; and a new model at that…!" Mu growled as his purple and green Astray hovered low over the ground firing its rifle several times. Despite its bulk, the Calamity proved surprisingly agile, stepping to the side and dodging all of his shots with ease.

"You're quick on your feet, aren't you?" Orga noted questioningly, firing after Mu's Astray with all of his weapons and forcing the ace pilot to concentrate on avoiding getting hit as opposed to actually counter-attacking.

"Exterminate…!" Clotho shrieked, transforming in mid-air and swinging his morning star outwards in a wide arc, smashing a pair of Astrays before the Extended fired his shield-mounted machine cannons and destroying a third Astray.

"A Gundam…!" Quattro said in surprise, dodging the Raider's face-mounted cannon and catching the Raider's morning star on his shield, which buckled under the force of the impact, but the reinforced body of his custom Astray held until he could deflect the strike.

"You're fast on your feet, little insect!" Clotho shrieked, firing his machine cannons and face-mounted cannon again and again until he had the red and black Astray where he wanted it. "Finally…fatality…!" he shouted, triumphantly launching his morning star. To his shock, the Orb mobile suit side-stepped the attack causing it to slam into the ground before it drew a beam sabre and cut the morning star's chain.

"No way…" Clotho whispered in disbelief, before his eyes widened in shock as the red and black unit fired off several shots. The Raider managed to dodge all but one of the beams, which he barely blocked with his shield, only for the unit to be sent flying back from the force of the enhanced beam.

"The three of you, stay back and focus on those GMs!" Quattro ordered the Astray Girls. "The Gundam is mine!"

"G-GMs…?" Asagi asked in confusion.

"I meant the Strike Daggers!" Quattro shouted in response as his Astray's shield exploded from the force of blocking the Raider's retaliatory strike from its face-mounted cannon; firing his beam rifle two-handed, he pressed his assault. "_Just because you're a Gundam doesn't mean you're invincible, especially not against the Red Comet!_"

* * *

Meanwhile, at the harbour, both the Archangel and the Orb fleet were surprised when one Aegis-class cruiser exploded seemingly out of nowhere. The question 'why' was soon answered when the Forbidden leapt clear of the explosion, its scythe glinting in the sunlight. Smirking, Shani fired the Forbidden's rail-guns and destroyed a nearby Kuraokami-class destroyer. The Strike immediately shifted its attention to the Forbidden, having occupied itself before then by shooting down missiles and Spearheads. To Kira's surprise, his beams were bent away from the unit, shortly before the Forbidden returned fire with its rail-guns. Kira dodged the shot, only for Shani to fire his plasma cannon, the EM fields of his rail-guns bending the beam towards the Strike and its surprised pilot. It would probably have hit the unit too, had a grenade not exploded against one of the Forbidden's heavy plates.

"Where'd that ordnance come from?" Murrue asked in surprise.

"Scanning…I've found it! But this is…!" Flay said from what was once Miriallia's post in the CIC. "They're G-Weapons: Duel and Blitz!"

"But why are they…?" Murrue responded with a whisper.

"What the hell are you doing, Yamato?" Yzak demanded from the shocked Kira over the communication lines. "Stop holding back and get serious already!"

"Kira…" Nicol told the Strike's pilot with an apologetic smile. "…buy us some time. We still need to reprogram our units' OS."

"R-roger…" Kira responded, still surprised over the situation, but already pulling himself together and re-focusing on the Forbidden.

"Gottfried, Valiant, target the Alliance G-Weapon, and fire!" Murrue ordered while the Coordinators were conversing with each other, forcing the Forbidden to back off, at least temporarily. "Keep up the pressure; Wombats and Hell Darts, fire!"

* * *

"_You're not looking so good." Murasame commented wryly, looking down at the red-uniformed boy contorted in pain before him, his uniform splattered with blood. "And this place is rather depressing too." He continued, looking at the surrounding debris field. "…but seriously, a shoal zone? Is that the best you can imagine?"_

"_Spare me the sarcasm!" Athrun Zala spat back. "If you're here to finish me off for good, then do it already."_

"_As if I could do that on my own…" Murasame said, crossing his arms and briefly closing his eyes. "…you a part of me, no, you are me. I can't kill you, though I suppose Ple could do it easily enough."_

"_Then why don't you just finish the job already?"_

"_Well, probably because you might prove useful for one thing." Murasame replied. "You, you're not a Titan, are you? You're uniform is too different from that of the Titans or the EFF, now that I've had a closer look. We were never a Cyber-Newtype were we? No, we…I am a Coordinator. I was Athrun Zala…"_

"_You finally understand…" Athrun snarled, sitting up. "…now that you do, can we end this farce?"_

"_No."_

"_What?"_

"_You heard me, no." Murasame said firmly. "I may have been, and you remain Athrun Zala, but right now we are Murasame Seven of the Zeon Mobile Suit Corps, sworn to the service of her Highness the Sovereign of the Principality of Zeon, Mineva Lao Zabi, the Queen of the Solar System."_

"_But t__hat's…!"_

"_I have more personal reasons as well." Murasame continued, waving a hand and changing the surrounding mindscape into a park in his home colony in Side 3._

"_That girl with the psychic powers…?" Athrun said in dawning comprehension, now recovered enough to stand. "…even so, I too have my obligations to…!"_

"_That Clyne girl, you mean?" Murasame cut off his other self. "True, but I have no feelings for her. My heart already belongs to Elpeo Ple. No, don't you dare interrupt. This is not a negotiation, it is an ultimatum!"_

_His expression stern, Murasame glared at Athrun Zala, the mindscape fading and being replaced by a ruined city, with a dark green mobile suit standing behind him and its mono-eye glowing fiercely. "As I said earlier, your abilities may prove useful, so here are my terms. I will allow you to send a written farewell message to that Lacus girl, and you will submit to my control but will continue to exist in the depths of our mind. Refuse and I will have Ple erase you once and for all."_

"_That's blackmail!" Athrun blurted out in outrage._

"_Enough; this is not a negotiation! I will give you a day to decide. As this mindscape is non-conducive to thought…" at that Murasame waved his arm and changed the surrounding mindscape yet again, this time to a vast and nigh-infinite field of stars. "…accept my offer, and together we shall see the world change. Together we may yet free our soul from gravity's grip, and hear the stars sing amidst the heavens of space."_

_At that, Murasame turned and vanished from the star-strewn mindscape, leaving Athrun Zala alone to sink to his knees. "Lacus…" he whispered, his eyes tearing._

* * *

"System connections all green…we can do this!" Yzak said in triumph, the Duel's engines flaring as the reprogrammed OS allowed the unit to hover a few meters over the ground. "Let's do this, Nicol!"

"I'm right behind you!" Nicol responded as both the Duel and the Blitz hovered over the water towards the Archangel, beam rifles firing at the Forbidden. Cornered between three other G-Weapons, the Forbidden was forced on the defensive, all but totally focused on maintaining the Geschmeidig Panzer and with barely enough chances to fire back. The Calamity meanwhile was still exchanging fire with Mu's Astray, with Quattro and Clotho doing likewise.

"You people are annoying!" Shani complained as his plasma cannon charged and fired towards the Archangel, catching the other G-Weapons by surprise, the beam lancing into the Archangel's side and destroying one of the Valiant rail-guns. He smirked, only for a sudden pain, as though all his nerves were on fire, to erupt across his body. Writhing in agony, he barely avoided/deflected vengeful strikes from the other G-Weapons, one of the Duel's beams destroying his scythe. Gasping in agony, he had the Forbidden dive into the ocean.

"Clotho…!" Orga shouted desperately, the same pain ripping through his flesh. In response, the Raider broke off engagement and transformed into mobile armour mode, allowing the Calamity to jump onto it before retreating.

* * *

"What the hell are you doing?" the fleet commander demanded from the three Extended Humans over the encrypted line. "A retreat order wasn't given, and your units should still have enough power!"

"Our formulas are done!" Orga gasped out, causing the admiral to grimace and Azrael to sigh in resignation.

"Well, I guess so much for that." The latter said, standing up and shrugging before turning to the fleet commander. "That should be enough for today."

"What?"

"Face it admiral, we won't be able to achieve anything without those three, so you might as well issue the retreat signal. We'll try again at first light."

Making a sound indicative of disgust, the fleet commander ordered the retreat, while Azrael headed down to sickbay to oversee the maintenance of his Extended Humans.

* * *

"That was too close…" Quattro said, looking at his unit's power indicator, which indicated approximately eighteen percent energy remaining in his unit's battery. "…I suppose I should have expected this. Not having a Minovsky Ultra-compact Nuclear Fusion Reactor is such a hassle."

* * *

"Issue the withdrawal order, and complete our units and ships' repair and resupply as soon as possible." Cagalli ordered in the Orb National Defence Headquarters. "And have Morgenroete refine whatever combat calibration those two ZAFT pilots did to their units."

* * *

A/N

I'm cruel aren't I, doing that to Athrun and Lacus? Still, it wouldn't be UC without some darkness in it; after all, one reason Zeon fans exist is because the Zeon are largely composed of a bunch of noble demons.

Oh, and one more thing: watch?v=gTw2YT6FeeE

I am not going to let that happen ever in this fanfic no matter what. As far as I'm concerned, the only ones who have the right to claim dominion over the solar system in Gundam are Dianna Soreil and Mineva Lao Zabi, seeing as they're the only living characters I know off in the meta-verse to actually have royal blood (Relena abdicated her throne, and the Athha are nobility, not royalty), not to mention they actually have what it takes to rule responsibly.


End file.
